


The Closest We Get

by oh_fudgecakes



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Action & Romance, Alternate Universe - Space, Anxiety Attacks, Drama, Ensemble Cast, Humor, M/M, Sci-Fi AU, Slow Burn, Space Battles, intergalactic politics, this ought to read like normal space au for anyone who hasn't watched voltron
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-19
Updated: 2018-04-06
Packaged: 2019-02-17 06:04:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 23,129
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13070670
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oh_fudgecakes/pseuds/oh_fudgecakes
Summary: Space AU. In the year 22XX, the universe lives in harmony under the protection of Voltron, a sentient humanoid weapon of legendary might, piloted by five Paladins of its choosing. As the latest team of Paladins approach retiring age, a universal scouting exercise is launched to find the next Paladins. Meanwhile, fighter pilot cadet Katsuki Yuuri crashes and burns while representing Earth at the Intergalactic Grand Prix. He does not expect to be mysteriously Chosen by Voltron to become the next Black Paladin, leader of Voltron, nor does he expect to find love along the way.As a sinister plot threatens to overthrow intergalactic peace, Yuuri must overcome his insecurities to take charge of Voltron — with a little help from his team and from a mysterious alien prince, the beautiful but infuriating Viktor.





	1. in which yuuri is victimized by his anxiety & also phichit

**Author's Note:**

> Welp, this was originally meant to be my submission for Big Bang on Ice, before the plot exploded and I realized it'd be closer to 50k than 15k words. Now that my BBOI is complete and awaiting publication in January, I finally got around to uploading this.
> 
> You don't need to have watched Voltron to read this. Enjoy!

_In dreams, he breathes stardust._

_Floating and bathed in light, galaxies stretch out on every side with him the center, and he reaches out with reverent fingers to touch, finally, to hold. He cradles the stars in his palms and breathes deep and slow._

_This is the closest we get to the stars._

 

 

 

“The shuttle has landed, cadet,” comes a disapproving voice, “Wake up!”

He opens his eyes.

 

* * *

 

The mess hall swims a little before him as he enters. Everything’s a blur, and the fluorescent lights only make his head pound harder as he heads for his usual table, where a blurry tan blob is seated. He reaches out blindly to feel for the edge of the table, before sliding gingerly onto the bench next to it.

He’s immediately tackled by the tan blob.

“There you are, Yuuri!” a chipper voice rings in his ear, “How’s the hangover?”

He just groans in response and closes his eyes tight.

“Gonna puke in your lap,” he manages.

Phichit lets go of him immediately.

He straightens up slowly, blinking a little. The mess hall remains a blur, and somehow that just adds to the general sense of unease. Great. He’s hungover, he doesn’t remember last night, and somehow, on top of that all, he’s also lost his glasses. His stomach hurts, probably from puking the whole shuttle ride back to Earth, but he doesn’t remember any bit of it.

Last night.

His heart begins to sink again, and as if sensing that, Phichit slides an arm around his shoulders.

“I can hear you beating yourself up in there,” he says, “Yuuri, it’s okay. There’s always next time, right?”

Yuuri just chuckles. He doesn’t think so.

The Galaxy Garrison had been established to train promising cadets into the next generation of elite astro-explorers. Young hopefuls went through a vigorous selection process before being sorted into one of various classes: engineers, medics, communications specialists, navigators, pilots— Yuuri had been lucky enough to be accepted as a fighter class pilot, but that’s where luck ended.

As of yesterday, he now holds the record of lowest simulation score in the history of the Intergalactic Grand Prix.

It’s a depressing statistic, and certainly not the result he’d expected when he’d joined the Intergalactic Grand Prix with Phichit all those months ago. There had been a number of other random cadets— he honestly didn’t know them very well— who had been willing, even _eager_ to join their team. They were probably regretting it now.

Well. It hadn’t been like he’d had much to lose anyway.

It had only been, like, _the_ most humiliatingly public way to crash and burn.

It wasn’t like the _whole world_ had seen it — only perhaps… eighty percent of it.

He slumps down against the table, burying his face in his arms. It honestly hurt to even _think_ about. His team had finished with the _lowest score in the entire history of the Intergalactic Grand Prix,_ and it had all been because of him. It’s difficult to think about the terrible last moments of their failed simulation, how he’d blanked out, how it had just been one bad decision after another after that.

Honestly, he doesn’t know why Phichit’s still talking to him. Phichit’s a great engineer. He’d done everything right. It just hadn’t been enough to make up for Yuuri’s bad leadership. If he were in Phichit’s shoes, he would be furious— and rightfully so. He’d humiliated _all_ of them.

A _slap_ to the back of his head.

He looks up, shocked. Phichit’s frowning at him, and he can’t help but recoil.

Perhaps Phichit _is_ angry after all.

“Sorry,” he mumbles to the table.

Phichit huffs.

“You should be,” he declares, “Stop apologising— it’s not needed, like really Yuuri, it’s okay— and _listen_ to this, will you?”

He realises belatedly that Phichit had been talking the whole time, but he’d been too caught up in his own thoughts to process anything.

“Sorry,” he apologises again, on pure instinct, and then bites his lip as he realises what he’s done.

“I’m going to pretend I didn’t hear that,” Phichit indulges, before waving his watch insistently in front of Yuuri’s face, “Just _look_ at this, Yuuri, isn’t this the news we’ve been waiting for?”

Yuuri obligingly leans in as Phichit taps the face of his watch. A holographic screen opens over it. Yuuri squints a little, regretting the loss of his glasses as the projected image comes into focus.

It’s— the news. There’s a blonde Altean boy who looks vaguely familiar, scowling as microphones are shoved into his face. Block letters scroll helpfully across the banner below him.

 

_UNDERAGE WINNER OF INTERGALACTIC JUNIOR GRAND PRIX, YURI PLISETSKY—_

 

At the name, Yuuri gets a sudden flashback. That boy. Confronting him in the bathroom after the Grand Prix.

“It’s him!” Yuuri blurts, “That little jerk!”

“What?”

The banner continues to scroll.

 

_—UNEXPECTEDLY CHOSEN BY RED LION AT AWARDS CEREMONY—_

 

“Oh,” Yuuri says blankly.

Jealousy rises unexpectedly within him, and he closes his eyes. The boy’s fifteen. Yuuri can be the bigger person. He doesn’t have to hold a grudge against a _pubescent boy, goddammit._ The boy’s only fifteen. The boy’s _only fifteen._ Reminding himself sternly of that, he takes a deep breath, and opens his eyes.

“When did this happen?” he asks.

“Yesterday,” Phichit responds absently, still watching the screen, “You were there, remember?”

He does not, in fact, remember.

“What?”

Phichit blinks at him.

“Oh,” he says suddenly, “I think that was after you’d left. You were very drunk.”

At the reminder, he winces a little. The unease surges once more. He has no recollection of the night before, and that seems suddenly very ominous. He wracks his brain but he can’t remember anything after the sixth, seventh, eighth… he doesn’t even _remember_ how many glasses of champagne he’d had. The rest of the night is just a black void.

What _had_ he done last night? Who’d seen it?

He’s suddenly acutely aware of every murmur within the mess hall, and is struck by the paranoid notion that they’re whispering about him. Are they talking about him? Why? What had he done? His breathing comes suddenly short.

There’s too much noise. The lights are too bright. The space of the mess hall seems to expand ever wider on every side of him, and it’s too big, too white, too _much._

“Yuuri?”

He buries his face in his hands and tries to regulate his breathing.

He can do this. It’s not the first time. He just has to — control the unease surging uncontrollably within him. He just has to _stop._

Deep breaths.

When he finally comes back to himself, Phichit’s rubbing his back comfortingly, leaning in close.

“It’s okay, Yuuri. Breathe with me. It’s okay. _Breathe.”_

“I’m okay,” he gasps, “I’m okay.”

Phichit straightens up, still rubbing his shoulder soothingly.

“What happened?”

Yuuri just shakes his head.

“Let’s just—“ he manages to choke out, “Not talk about last night again.”

On the holographic screen, a tall silver-haired Altean guides an agitated-looking Yuri Plisetsky away from the reporters.

 

* * *

 

 

Yuuri had been five the day he’d met Okukawa Minako, five— and starstruck.

An early morning in March. His mother had returned from the train station, beaming, and their guest had ducked in through the doorway after her. He’d been sitting at the table with his father, washing the rice for lunch, but he had recognised her immediately.

On the news, she had always seemed larger than life, covered head to toe in her flight suit with her hard grey eyes. In person, she had been only human. Draped in a oversized navy coat and a mustard yellow scarf that didn’t quite match, she had been in her forties then, the barest hint of grey in her hair. Her eyes had been soft, so soft, as she’d looked at him.

“Hello Yuuri,” she’d said, “You haven’t met me before, but my name is Okukawa Minako.”

She’d smiled.

“I’m your godmother.”

 

 

 

Okukawa Minako, the first female Japanese fighter pilot, and a Paladin of Voltron. She’d been Chosen after graduating the Garrison and had spent the next twenty years off-planet, conducting intergalactic diplomacy. Who _hadn’t_ heard of her? She was the stuff of legends, Earth’s pride and joy. Retiring in her forties, she had returned home to look for family, and apparently, her only family was Yuuri.

Five years old and starstruck, and she’d taken him out, out of the city and human civilisation, out past the familiar lights and skyscrapers, out into the wilderness, out into the darkness, out to see the stars. It had been him and Minako that night, by the lake— the best day of his childhood. Paddling out slow in a little row boat, the sound of the oars cutting through water, letting his fingertips trail through the surface of the lake as he turned his face up to the moonlight.

Above, the constellations burnt bright in the night sky, untouched by the light of civilisation as Minako rowed them slowly out into the middle of the lake, and then stopped.

“It’s only in the deepest dark that the stars shine brightest,” she’d said, and laid down in the boat, “Come over here.”

He’d laid down next to her and she’d guided his hand, tracing the constellations with their fingertips. And she’d told him tales, such tales she’d told— of the giants of legends, of heroes and saints, of the worthy and the brave immortalised in the night sky as constellations. She’d told him also of her own tales, of real adventures and intergalactic diplomacy, of the planets far up and beyond the stars.

“Have you ever been flying?” she’d asked.

“In the family car,” he’d said, “When mama needs to go into the city for groceries.”

And she’d laughed.

“Maybe one day you’ll get to go flying,” she’d said, “Not just in the family car, but up, up beyond the highest skyscrapers and up beyond the sky. Out there it’s darker than night, and if you reach out, it’s almost as if you could touch the stars— just like the giants of legends.”

“Have _you_ touched a star?” Yuuri had gasped, and Minako had laughed again.

“You can’t touch a star, sweetie,” she’d said, “But I’ve come close— the closest we get to the stars.”

 

 

  
  
The thing is that peace was not always a constant. The stars were not always safe.

In a time not very long ago, there was the Galra Empire, a vile race, and enemy to all free people. For millennia, they conquered and enslaved entire civilisations, destroying planets, or turning them into mining colonies for precious minerals to build their battle fleet. For millennia, the universe lived in fear.

Then, _Voltron_ emerged.

A legendary weapon of ultimate power formed by five sentient Lions, each piloted by a Paladin of its Choosing— it vanquished the Galra Empire and established peace and order throughout the universe.

In the aftermath, the Paladins, represented by the Princess Allura of Altea, had worked tirelessly to unite the fragmented peoples of the universe. Years of diplomatic efforts had eventually paid off in the signing of the Voltron Peace Treaty, under which a new system of intergalactic diplomacy had been established. The next Paladins would be a diverse team of trained astro-explorers scouted from around the universe, and Voltron would become a force for intergalactic diplomacy.

Each team of Paladins would step down every twenty to thirty years, and a universal scouting exercise would be launched to find the new batch of Paladins. The Lions would be delivered to each and every planet that was party to the Treaty, where the Paladins would be Chosen from amongst graduates of each planet’s astro-exploration programme.

Okukawa Minako had been one of those Paladins— the Black Paladin, head of Voltron and leader of the Paladins.

 

 

 

“You want to go to the Garrison, don’t you?” Minako had asked him, “Perhaps one day you’ll become a Paladin too.”

 

* * *

 

“That— was an absolute disaster.”

Yuuri winces at the reprimand.

Phichit meets his eye briefly, before looking back down at the floor. Commander Celestino’s polished leather boots continue to pace disapprovingly back and forth in front of them. Yuuri keeps his eyes down, arms clasped neatly behind his back and legs shoulder-width apart.

“Today’s simulation was designed to test adaptability in the face of difficulty. But instead of keeping a cool head as the mission began to go south, you started making impulse decisions without thinking. You _had a plan,_ cadet, a good one. Did you forget your own plan?”

Those leather boots make one more trip up, and then down, before they draw to a slow halt in front of Yuuri.

“You’ve been failing _every single one_ of your simulations for the last week, cadet.”

It’s true, and he can feel his cheeks warming with the shame of it.

“And while I always expect a certain number of failed simulations from you—“

_Ouch._

“—this is excessive, Yuuri. What happened?”

Yuuri blinks a few times, then licks his dry lips. He honestly has no answer. He'd just— he'd just blanked. His focus has just been shot lately. He's felt raw for days. But he can't tell Celestino _that._

“I don’t know, sir,” he mumbles instead.

And Commander Celestino sighs.

“I hope you remember that being admitted to the Garrison is a privilege of the highest degree,” he says quietly, “Take your simulations seriously.”

Yuuri bites his lip. He _is_ taking them seriously. It’s not like he isn’t trying. He’s just— he’s just _mentally weak._ And to his horror, he finds himself beginning to tear in frustration.

The class begins to murmur.

Yuuri sniffles, and quickly drags his sleeve over his eyes. For the millionth time since the disastrous Prix, he wishes he hadn't lost his glasses. He can't see their faces. He doesn't know what they’re thinking.

There’s a moment of silence, before the commander pats him awkwardly on the shoulder.

“But bad decisions aside,” he adds, more gently, “Your flying was excellent as always. Well done, cadet.”

Someone begins to clap, and then stops when no one else follows. A moment later, a small smattering of disorganised applause breaks out. Yuuri shuts his eyes tight against the humiliation.

To be seen as weak enough to need _coddling,_ to need _pity-praise_ — It’s humiliating. It’s _absolutely_ humiliating. He _hates_ being pitied and he _hates_ to be seen crying, but he’s bad at controlling the tears. Just another item in the long list of things he’s bad at, he guesses.

As the applause dies, he drags his sleeve across his face one more time, and lifts his chin up.

“Thank you, sir,” he manages miserably.

The commander pats him on the shoulder one last time, before turning to the rest of the class.

“Next team. Up in the simulator now.”

 

* * *

 

 

That night, he heads up to the roof after lights out. Security will know he left his room after dark, but he needs this. He needs the reminder.

Lying back against the hard concrete of the Garrison roof, he looks up and into the stars. The Garrison is set in the middle of a desert, a military facility of highest security. There is no civilisation around them for miles and miles. From the roof, there is some light pollution from the lights on the Garrison facility, but otherwise, it’s just darkness until the horizon.

It’s one of the best places on Earth to see the stars.

He raises one arm to trace the constellations, mouthing their names slowly, rolling them over his tongue as he recalls the stories behind them. The brave and the worthy, immortalised in starlight. There’s one star out there, he knows, named after Minako. In his childhood, he’d had to wake up early in the morning if he’d wanted to see it. It would only appear in the sky near the dawn. Here at the Garrison however, he’s all the way on the other side of the globe, and it’s shining directly above him right now.

He smiles wistfully as he looks at it through his reaching fingers.

It seems almost to twinkle in response.

 

* * *

 

 

Phichit runs, quite literally, into him in the hallway the next day. He’s all but vibrating with excitement, flapping something frantically in Yuuri’s face with barely-restrained glee.

“Have-you-seen-this-have-you-seen-this-have-you-seen-this?” he rattles out in one delighted breath.

Yuuri leans back and away, grabbing Phichit’s wrist to still the relentless flapping. He squints a little, half-blind, until the flyer comes into focus. It’s not so much a flyer as it is— a notice. Printed in very official looking script, with the crest of Altea embossed at the bottom. It’s a notice for—

“The Garrison’s holding a scouting exercise,” Yuuri realises, “This week.”

And then he frowns at Phichit.

“You know that only graduates can join the scouting exercise, right?” he says skeptically, “What are you so excited about?”

“What am I so excited about?” Phichit demands, “It’s our chance to take a close-up look at the Lions!”

Yuuri blinks.

“What.”

“The Red Lion’s already Chosen its Paladin, and so has the Blue Lion—“

“Wait, hold up a minute,” Yuuri tries to cut in, but is promptly bulldozed over by the sheer force of Phichit’s enthusiasm.

“—so I took the liberty of hacking into the the hangar’s security cameras—“

 _“What?”_ Yuuri hisses, and then looks quickly over his shoulder to make sure no one’s overheard them— _“Phichit, you can’t just—“_

“— and just as I thought—“

His headache worsens.

“Phichit,” he tries again.

 _“Shhh!”_ Phichit shushes, looks over his shoulder, and then leans in close, “—the Green Lion, the Yellow Lion, _and_ the Black Lion are already _here at the Garrison_.”

Yuuri closes his eyes and counts to five.

“Phichit,” he says patiently, when he’s done, “We haven’t graduated. We aren’t getting anywhere _near_ those Lions.”

“Not if I have anything to say about it!” Phichit chirps.

And Yuuri is starting to get a bad feeling about this all. This just screams of the beginnings of another one of Phichit’s _shenanigans_ , and those never end well. Phichit winks, and nudges him, still vibrating— and _oh,_ now he just _knows_ this is going to be trouble.

“Come on, Yuuri,” he wheedles, “Ask me what I mean.”

“What do you mean?” Yuuri asks reluctantly.

Phichit skips around to his front and leans in close.

“Tonight,” he whispers, “We’re breaking into the hangars, you and I, Yuuri—”

“Phichit, no—”

“I can get us in without anyone knowing—”

“Phichit, please—”

“We take a look at the Lions, _up close and in person, Yuuri—”_

“Phichit!” Yuuri hisses.

“And we’ll be out before anyone knows better!”

Yuuri crosses his arms, and widens his stance a little for strength. He closes his eyes and calls for more strength, then opens his eyes and looks at Phichit firmly. Phichit is already looking back at him, wobbly-lipped. He stands firm. He takes a deep breath.

“No,” he says.

“No?” Phichit repeats tearfully.

“No,” he says.

“No?” Phichit repeats, even more tearfully.

Yuuri bites his lip. He closes his eyes again and calls for more strength. Then he makes the mistake of looking Phichit in the eye. There are actual crocodile tears shimmering there. All the strength goes out of him in a whoosh, and he slumps. He puts his face in his hands for a moment. Phichit is already buzzing, sensing his imminent capitulation.

“Yes,” he says helplessly.

“Yes?” Phichit cries.

“Yes,” he says, even more helplessly.

“Yes!” Phichit grabs his hands in both of his, jumping up and down, “You’re gonna thank me for this later, Yuuri. You’ve been in a funk all week, and I’m telling you, _this_ is what we need to get you up and running again!”

“This,” Yuuri echoes emptily, “By this, you mean a felony?”

And _that_ is why he _always_ gets a bad feeling about Phichit’s shenanigans. They never end in anything legal. When will he learn to say no to Phichit? When will he learn to say no, full-stop? Why did he have to be born Japanese? Except no, his heritage really doesn’t have anything to do with this. His sister has no trouble saying no. She says it all the time. Why did he have to be born as himself? No wait, why did he have to be born?

As if sensing his thoughts, Phichit slings an arm around his neck, still vibrating with excitement.

“Don’t worry so much, Yuuri!” he sings, “It’s not a felony unless we get caught!”

Yuuri puts his face in his hands with a quiet sob.

 

 

 

They do it after lights out. Phichit works his mysterious tech genius to get their dorm rooms open without alerting security, and then they are creeping through the darkened hallways.

“Phichit,” Yuuri whispers, “I still don’t think this is a good idea.”

“You want to see the Lions, don’t you?” Phichit hisses back over his shoulder, “Live a little, Yuuri. You’ve been in a funk, and I _really_ think this is the best way to break you out of it!”

“And I _really_ don’t agree with—”

 _“Shhh,_ we’re heading past the commanders’ rooms now. You’ll wake them up.”

Yuuri shuts up. Phichit patters slowly on ahead, peering carefully down each hallway for people wandering the halls.

Yuuri has a bad feeling about this. He has _such_ a bad feeling about this. He _always_ has a bad feeling about Phichit’s shenanigans. He just can’t ever say no to them. In freshman year, that had ended with him naked and shivering on a tower bridge at three in the morning. Another time in sophomore, he’d come away from it with suction marks around his inner thigh. He doesn't think _anyone_ ought to be comfortable with having an octopus that near one’s genitals. And yet, somehow that had been far from the last time he had let Phichit convince him to go skinny dipping.

Why do all of Phichit’s shenanigans end with him naked anyway? And more importantly, would this all somehow end up with him naked again?

“Be at peace with your natural self, Yuuri,” Phichit whispers then, “The system of clothing is man-made. It’s all a social construct.”

He draws to a halt in front of the hangar doors.

“We’re here,” he says, and turns to beckon Yuuri over, “Now quick! Take off your clothes!”

“I—” Yuuri begins, _“What?”_

“Just kidding. Not all our adventures have to end with you naked.”

“Phichit—” Yuuri groans, but the boy just bends down and opens the wiring of the door’s keypad. Yuuri can’t see exactly what he does, but a moment later, it flashes green and the doors begin to open with an _extremely loud_ beeping noise.

“Phichit—” he says again, but Phichit jams a screwdriver somewhere in there, and the beeping immediately stops.

“Sorry,” he says casually, “I forgot the doors all do that when they open.”

The moment the doors are open enough for them to squeeze through, they do, and Phichit does something to the keypad on the other side to make them close again. Inside the hangar, there’s a massive battleship, likely the one used to transport the Lions in. Behind it, there are three open doors into the smaller hangars, each probably housing one Lion.

They share a look, before beginning to make their way toward those doors. As they pass the large ship though, Phichit straightens suddenly, and begins looking around him.

“Did you hear that?” he asks in a whisper.

“Hear what?”

“I don’t know. It’s like— there was an image in my head suddenly.”

“Did you mix Monster into your coffee again?”

Phichit huffs, but seems distracted still, looking back and forth, closing his eyes as if listening for something. He straightens suddenly.

“I have to go,” he says abruptly, and scurries off towards the left.

“Phichit—” Yuuri hisses, “Stay _together—”_

He doubles over as a strange feeling comes over him. If one could call a feeling loud, that’s what he would call it, a low resonating echo that reverberates throughout his whole body. In the midst of it, he gets a split-second flash of an image— a profile of a woman looking down at a small photograph, hair falling down to hide her face.

It’s over as quick as it came.

He straightens slowly, warily, and finds himself staring straight down the door in the middle. Beyond the doorway, the Black Lion sits majestically on its haunches, a particle barrier forming a huge dome separating it from everyone. It’s mechanical eyes are fixed on Yuuri.

Drawn by some indescribable force, Yuuri begins to walk, crossing the distance between them. As he moves, he gets the strange sensation that the Lion’s eyes are following him, despite it never moving at all.

He draws to a halt just before the particle barrier, suddenly overcome by emotion.

Well.

This is it, then.

This is the closest he’ll ever get to his dream of becoming a Paladin.

Wistfully, he raises one palm, and lays it flat against the barrier.

The Black Lion sits back on its haunches, opens its massive maw, and lets out an ear-splitting _roar._

Yuuri clasps his palms over his ears, but there’s no way to block out the magnitude of that mind-numbing sound. It goes on for so long that he sinks to his knees, putting his arms over his head as he lays himself flat on the ground, breath coming hard and fast.

“Stop,” he tries to shout over the noise, eyes shut, _“Please_ stop!”

Darkness begins to creep in along the sides of his vision.

“I’m sorry,” he whispers, before everything goes black.

 

* * *

 

He wakes into pandemonium. He can see the boots of military officers running back and forth, tinted oddly blue. There are muffled voices yelling about intruders, about the Black Lion and the Yellow Lion, and he realizes with no small amount of dread— that they’ve been found out.

His stomach sinks and he feels like he’s going to be sick. This is the end. He’s not sure if they are going to be arrested for what they’ve done, but they will certainly be expelled. The Lions are sacred, and they shouldn’t have broken in, shouldn’t have trespassed into such respected territory.

“Cadet,” a muffled voice calls, “Katsuki, can you hear me?”

He straightens up slowly, and frowns. He’s separated from the officers by a particle barrier, but why—

He looks up.

The Black Lion towers protectively over him. He’s lying under its belly. Somehow, he’d managed to get _inside_ its particle barrier.

“Katsuki,” It’s Celestino— “Tell the Lion to put the particle barrier down.”

Him? Why him?

“Can—” he tries anyway, stuttering despite himself, “Can you put down the particle barrier— please?”

It begins from the top, the barrier slowly chipping and fading away layer by layer until it’s all gone.

He scrambles to his feet and stands at attention, eyes lowered. When no reprimand immediately comes, he closes his eyes, bracing for the no-doubt scathing admonishment that the officers are preparing. Perhaps they don’t even know how to begin. The magnitude of their folly is— he cannot even begin to describe it himself.

Finally, there’s a sigh.

“The Black Lion has Chosen its Paladin,” Celestino declares quietly, “And so has the Yellow. We must prepare our announcement to the Altean Council.”

Murmurs of agreement. The officers slowly begin to file out of the room. Yuuri finally looks up, confused. Through the hangar doors, he catches a glimpse of Phichit, sitting on the Yellow Lion’s right paw, looking equally shaken.

 

* * *

 

“The Castle of Lions has come for you,” is all they are told after a couple of days’ suspension from class, going stir-crazy shut up in their rooms.

The Castle of Lions. Yuuri had always wondered if it really existed, or if it was just a thing of legends.

As legend went, Altea and the Alteans, the advanced alien race that had created Voltron, had been destroyed by the Galra Empire ten thousand years ago. However, as the destruction of Altea had become imminent, King Alfor had put his daughter into cryogenic sleep in the Castle, along with a retainer, and sent them and the Lions far away to hide them from the Galra Empire. In the cartoons, the Castle of Lions had always been the traditional home of the Paladins, a courtesy extended by the royals of Altea. The Castle of Lions, improbably, had been a castle _as well as_ a massive spacecraft— which was where Yuuri’s suspension of disbelief had always ended.

But now, it looks like the Castle actually does exist.

In the shuttle up to the Castle, Phichit reaches over to hold Yuuri’s hand. Yuuri squeezes back, and they don’t let go until the shuttle has landed.

They step out of the Shuttle into some sort of hangar. In front of them, a woman—unmistakably alien, is ticking something off on a clipboard. Her skin is a dark yellow, and her hair is green. She has violet eyes framed in thick dark lashes.

“Hello,” she says, “I’m Sara Crispino of Olkarion, and I’m the Castle’s navigator. Please follow me.”

They follow her wordlessly out of the hangar, and through a long series of metal hallways. It seems that the Castle is really more of a ship than it is a castle. Even from the exterior, which he'd gotten a glance of from the shuttle, the Castle is very clearly a ship. He's not very sure why the cartoons had always made it out to be a literal flying Castle.

Finally, they emerge into the ship’s bridge. There, there’s a Galra in Blue armour, and a blonde boy in red. It takes Yuuri a moment to notice his pointed ears. He’s Altean— and a strangely familiar looking one at that.

The boy turns at their entrance, and upon spotting Yuuri, scoffs.

“Not _you,”_ he complains, “I remember you from the Grand Prix,” he sneers, “Dead last.”

Yuuri abruptly recognizes the boy. It’s Yuri Plisetsky, the young Altean prodigy who’d won the junior Prix. They’d met after the race. Yuri had walked in on him in tears, and had screamed at him to quit flight school. He remembers seeing the news that the boy had been unexpectedly Chosen at the Grand Prix awards ceremony, when the Lions had been paraded through the crowd.

Yuri holds out something to him.

He blinks, eyes taking awhile to focus without his glasses. When it comes into focus though, he recognizes it immediately.

It’s his glasses.

“You were so goddamned drunk at the after-party,” Yuri rolls his eyes, “You left this behind.”

Yuuri closes his eyes, humiliated.

_Fuck._

 

* * *

 

They wait around in the bridge for about half an hour. During that time, they learn that the Galra in blue is a cargo pilot named Christophe, Chosen at a scouting exercise. Yuri is Altean, Altea’s junior pride and joy, and he proudly professes to be the youngest Paladin ever Chosen. Yuuri doesn’t really like him, and is honestly still partially convinced that this is either all a bizarre dream, or otherwise just a big mistake. He leaves Phichit to make friendly, opting instead to stay quiet.

Around the half-hour mark, Sara returns with a tall young man. He’s dressed in a white flight suit, and when he takes off his helmet and shakes his hair free, his hair is a strange silver— bright as starshine and tied back neatly into a ponytail. He would look human, if not for the ears.

“I’m Viktor,” he introduces, “I’m the pilot of this ship.”

He’s very— pretty, in a chiseled marble kind of way, pale as snow and with impossibly blue eyes that glow a little too blue to be exactly human. When he catches Yuuri staring, he winks.

Yuuri immediately averts his eyes, feeling heat rising to his cheeks. The man’s grin is so photogenic, neither too wide nor too small, that it feels almost too bright to look at.

“We’ll be moving soon,” the man— Viktor, continues, “We’re heading to a different star system to pick up our Green Paladin. I suggest you all find a seat and put on your safety harnesses if you don’t want any bruises.”

Yuuri takes a seat, clicking his safety harness on as he watches Viktor step up to the main console, a podium like structure under the tip of a giant crystal. There are no buttons on the console at all. It’s nothing like he’s ever seen. But Viktor just puts his hands on the console, and closes his eyes. The crystal lights up, and his hair hair begins to float up behind him, ethereal, as he begins to _glow._

Yuuri just stares, open-mouthed, for a moment. He toys again with the idea that this is all bizarre dream.

“The Castle is a bioship,” Christophe whispers to him then, smiling at his confusion, “The ship’s linked to Viktor’s life-force. He controls it that way. It’s one of the perks of being Altean royalty.”

_Altean royalty._

“We’ll be travelling several light years, so I’ll be opening a wormhole to our destination to save us the travel time. This spacecraft is top of the notch—” and here, he pauses to throw them all another wink over his shoulder, “And so is your pilot, so don’t worry about getting there in one piece.”

Yuri rolls his eyes.

“Do you ever get tired of the sound of your own voice?” he cuts in, which, _wow, rude!_ Yuuri would never imagine speaking to _Japanese_ royalty the same way Yuri is speaking to— _apparently,_ his prince.

The ship lurches forward suddenly. Yuri yelps as he flies forward in his harness, before knocking back in his seat. He’s a little too small for the harness. The rest of them are only mildly shaken.

“Sorry, what was that?” Viktor asks sweetly, without turning around, “I couldn’t hear you!”

Christophe just laughs, and the two share a look. They must be friends.

Viktor looks forward again, and the glow around him intensifies as he closes his eyes again. Ahead, a shining vortex of light opens up.

Yuuri gasps.

“Just the wormhole, no worries.”

The ship rattles concerningly as they pass through the wormhole, as if fighting against some major wind resistance. Yuuri clenches down, white knuckled in his seat, but Viktor seems unfazed. Everything is probably going as usual. Probably.

After a couple seconds, the end of the tunnel becomes visible. He can see a cluster of unfamiliar constellations— a whole new star system, he realises, because he knows every single one of the stars in his own sky. A moment later, they break out through the end of wormhole, and slow. There's a blue planet near them, a planet that he soon realises isn’t a planet. It’s a Balmera. He’s learnt about those at the Garrison, massive petrified space creatures so large that they are often mistaken as planets. Those who live on it belong to a species of aliens called Balmerans.

They click into orbit around the Balmera and Viktor takes his hands off the console. He stops glowing as he does, which Yuuri is somewhat relieved by. He’s still partially entertaining the thought that this is all a very, very bizarre dream.

In the windscreen, he can see a space shuttle making its way slowly up to them. Compared to the magnitude of the Castle, it’s merely a speck. As it begins to disappear below view of the windscreen, Sara turns and exits the bridge quietly. Viktor steps down from the console to sling an arm over Christophe’s shoulder.

“Didn’t I tell you you’d be Chosen?” he laughs jovially.

“Yes,” Christophe chuckles, “But I’m guessing the Council wasn’t too happy about— well, you know.”

He gestures at himself.

“They can keep their prejudices to themselves,” Viktor says sharply, “They weren’t happy about anyone. But it’s the Lions’ Choices, not theirs.”

Yuuri looks around at them all. A Galra cargo pilot, a fifteen-year-old, and two ungraduated cadets who’d been Chosen because they’d committed a felony— breaking and entering.

“They probably weren’t pleased about me either,” a female voice comes from behind him suddenly, and he all but jumps out of his skin.

Behind him, a Balmeran puts a hand to her mouth.

“Sorry, didn’t mean to startle you,” she says, before continuing, “I’m not even a pilot. I’m an engineer, and a Balmeran one at that. We’re not exactly known for being high-tech.”

“Hey!” Phichit shouts, jumping up with one palm held high, “Engineering buddies!”

She perks up.

“You’re an engineer too?”

“Yeah! High-five!”

She looks at his hand. There’s a moment where she just looks confused, then she just hugs him instead. She’s so big that she lifts him right off his feet.

“High-fives aren’t a thing elsewhere, I’m guessing. But hugs are good too,” Phichit allows sagely, “I’m Phichit. I’m from Earth.”

“I’m Mila,” she replies, setting him down, “I’m Balmeran.”

“Christophe of Mamora,” the Galra offers with an easy smile.

“Yuri of Altea,” the boy says sullenly, after a short pause.

“Yuuri. Earth,” Yuuri mumbles.

Mila laughs.

“Well, _that’s_ going to be confusing!”

Viktor steps forward.

“You’re absolutely right,” he announces, “And that’s why Yuri,” he points, “will be Yurio from now on.”

“Why me?” Yuri(o) demands, “I was here first! _He_ should be Yurio.”

“Yuuri is older than you,” Viktor interjects sweetly, “So actually _he_ was here first, in the grand scheme of things. Any other objections?”

“Yes!”

Viktor pretends not to hear him.

“Good!” he says, clapping his hands, “Welcome to Team Voltron, everyone. Get to know one another because we’re going to be family from now on!”

As everyone clusters together, Yuuri can feel his breath beginning to catch. Yuri is still grumbling a little, but otherwise, everyone else is beginning to chatter, smiling like old friends and— and everything is moving so fast now, and he knows— he knows this is a mistake. It’s all a big mistake. He shouldn’t be here.

“No, I’m sorry—” he cuts in, “I don’t think—

The chatter stops. They’re all looking at him now, and he can't— he closes his eyes and takes a breath.

“I never _agreed_ to this!” he finally manages, gesturing around at all of them, _“Any_ of this— I never—”

He takes another breath, and—

_“I never said I wanted to be a Paladin of Voltron!”_

The bridge goes absolutely silent.

Yuuri keeps his eyes closed, breathing shallowly.

“Yuuri,” Phichit whispers, shocked, laying a hand on his shoulder, but he just shrugs it off.

“Maybe I don’t want to be a Paladin,” he continues, and then put his hands over his eyes as he feels them begin to sting, “God, I need— I need some time to _think_ about this. Okay? _Please!”_

When he looks again at the rest of them, there’s a stricken look on Viktor’s face. Unable to face it, he turns and heads quickly for the nearest exit. The doors open automatically when he approaches, and he ducks through and spins around, sliding slowly down the wall until he’s sitting on the floor. He closes his eyes and buries his face in his hands, breathing slow and deep. The instinctive tears begin to recede.

God, he hates that he cries when he’s close to an attack.

A hand on his knee.

He looks up.

It’s Phichit.

“What do you mean, Yuuri?” he implores, “Isn’t this everything you’ve always dreamed of?”

Yuuri bites his lip.

“I don’t know if I can,” he confesses, “What if I can’t do it, Phichit?”

“You’ve _already_ done it, Yuuri,” Phichit says, confused, “The Black Lion Chose _you.”_

“That’s not what I meant,” Yuuri mumbles, putting his head back in his hands.

He hears Phichit take a breath, as if to say something further, then let it out after a moment. He turns to sit against the wall with Yuuri, slinging an arm around his shoulder. They sit there together in silence until the doors open, and Viktor steps out. His face is perfectly composed into a polite smile. Yuuri can’t tell what he’s actually thinking.

“We have rooms prepared for the both of you,” he explains quietly, “But if you’d like to return to Earth, that can also be arranged.”

 

* * *

 

 

Returning home after that is anticlimactic.

He can’t go back to the Garrison. He and Phichit haven’t been _formally_ expelled— the Garrison had officially classed it in nicer terms— but they’ve _effectively_ been expelled. He hasn’t been home in years, but he’d thought he’d at least have something to show upon returning for his time away. But he has nothing, not even a Garrison certification.

The more modern transport systems only exist between the bigger cities. The ones between the smaller ones have not been rebuilt, so he finds himself having to take an old-fashioned train back home, watching the rice-fields pass in a golden blur against the mid-morning sun, the pistons of the train thrusting on and on beneath him. It’s nostalgic.

The moment he steps off the train, the harmony of it all is disrupted by a burst of confetti.

“Welcome home!” a crowd of people scream, as he blinks, bewildered.

Minako is standing right at the front of that crowd, holding a banner (that reads Welcome Home Yuuri!!! with three exclamation marks), and the rest of the crowd is erupting with constant camera flashes. He feels immediately overwhelmed.

Minako snatches him up by the elbow and starts to lead him through the station, chattering away about something or another, but it all sounds as if coming from underwater, muffled. He closes his eyes tight to escape it all for a few moments, before opening them again. He vaguely registers that the posters of Minako that had always lined the stations since he was a child, have now been replaced by posters of _him._

“Let’s go say hi to some of your fans, shall we?” Minako trills, clearly delighted, but he just shakes his head fervently.

“No, Minako-sensei,” he says, shaking his head, “No.”

She looks at him, and seems to guess his current state, because she just nods.

“Alright then,” she says, “Do you want to go home now?”

“Yes,” he says, relieved, “Please.”

 

 

 

“Yuuri,” his mother’s voice chimes the moment he steps through the door, “Welcome home!”

He almost cries at the sound of it.

He’s immediately bundled up in his mother’s embrace. He puts his face in her shoulder as pattering steps come down the stairs.

“Is that our Yuuri?” his father’s voice calls.

“It is! Our Yuuri’s come home!”

Yuuri closes his eyes.

 

 

 

He stays for three days, sinking back into the usual routine of small-town life: helping with the cooking and cleaning around the inn, setting up rooms for guests, putting the towels up to dry for the _onsen_. He does not speak much to anyone throughout it all.

He tells only Mari of the whole truth, of how he and Phichit were _actually_ Chosen, not the polite version the Garrison had told to the public, about how he’d finished dead last in the last Grand Prix.

“I saw on TV,” Mari admits.

And he just wants to cry from the humiliation of it all. His eyes begin to sting, but he wipes the tears away before they can fall, sniffling quietly.

Mari puts a hand on his shoulder comfortingly.

“Yuuri,” she says, “Wasn’t this your dream all along? Not many people get to fulfill a dream like this. _Was_ it not your dream?”

He shrugs.

“Yes,” he says, then, “No,” and then, “I don’t know.”

He puts his face in his hands.

“I don’t know,” he says miserably.

Mari just pulls him, wordlessly, into a hug.

 

* * *

 

On the third day, his mother comes to him, and that’s when he knows he has to make his choice, once and for all. She comes to him, quietly, and asks him, just as quietly: “Why are you still here?” and “When are you leaving?”

He has no answer for that.

“I don’t know,” he says, and averts his eyes. He cannot meet her gaze.

She just looks at him for a long moment.

“Are you running, Yuuri?” she asks.

Guilty tears spring immediately to his eyes. He nods miserably through the tears. His mother just looks at him a moment longer, before she puts an arm around him, and draws him to her.

“Okay,” she says, “You can run for awhile.”

He leans his face against her shoulder as she runs her fingers slowly and soothingly through his hair. Somewhere, muffled voices come from a television. Glasses are clinking quietly in the main room. He can hear running water from the fountains in the _onsen._

“But you know, Yuuri, you can’t run forever.”

And she’s right.

That evening, he takes a walk out to Minako’s cabin by the bay. She runs a bar during the day, but today is her day off. She’s sitting in an old beach chair by the water, the seat made of plastic straps bleached yellow with age in the sun, holding a bottle of _sake._ The waves wash gently onto the grey pebbles at her bare feet in the fading light. Beside her, there’s an empty beach chair, which he takes.

“Are you done running, Yuuri?” she asks, quiet from the alcohol in her system.

And he turns his face away, ashamed.

“Wasn’t this what you wanted?”

“I don’t know.”

Minako turns to look at him, eyes half-lidded from the _sake._ He remembers the times he’d pitied her in his childhood, pitied her for the way being a Paladin had left her: at the bottom of a bottle, her heart forever longing for the stars. There’s something in her, he knows, that never came back from space.

Finally, she turns back to look over the bay.

“Why did you want to be a Paladin, Yuuri?” she sighs.

He opens his mouth, and then closes it. He has no answer.

“I don’t know,” he admits.

“Was it because of the stars?”

And he remembers then, remembers reaching out, stars in his hands, remembers the best night of his childhood, out in the rowboat with him, Minako, and the stars—

But no, that’s not quite it.

“I wanted to be _worthy,”_ he says, “Worthy enough to reach the stars, like the giants of legends— worthy enough to _become_ a legend, to become a Paladin.”

Minako looks at him, eyes glinting beetle-black in the fast-falling darkness.

“Then why are you running?”

Yuuri looks away.

“Because I’m not,” he whispers hoarsely, “ _I’m_ _not_ _worthy_.”

 

 

 

The very next day, his bags are all packed. He gives his mother a kiss on each cheek, hugs his sister, and when his father claps him on the shoulder, he turns and hugs him too.

“I’ll be gone for years,” he whispers in the man’s ear, and his arms tighten around Yuuri.

 

 

 

When he steps out of the shuttle, Viktor is waiting for him in the hangar. He’s not smiling, but there’s a pleased glow in his eyes. They smile for him.

“Welcome home, Paladin,” he says quietly.

 

 

 

And below the night sky, Minako had reached out and up to the stars.

“There are some things that you can never quite achieve,” she’d said, “You can’t touch a star— but you can come close if you keep trying. Are you giving up now?”

And Yuuri had thought carefully about that.

“No,” he’d decided.

“Why do you want to be a Paladin?” Minako had asked again.

“Because it’s not what I wanted,” Yuuri had answered, “But it’s the closest I can get to realizing my dream.”

 


	2. in which there's lots of yelling and yuri is sir yells-a-lot

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Right, so at this point I feel that I should explain to those who don't watch Voltron that Voltron is a giant humanoid robot formed by combining the five Lions. Like, they literally conjoin to form Voltron, i.e. Yuuri's Lion forms the head, Yuri's Lion forms the right arm, Mila's the left arm, etc. Enjoy the chapter!

His first night in the Castle, he spends a long time curled up by the window in his room. He’s seen the stars from some of the darkest places on Earth— the Garrison being one of them, and then there’d been the times Minako had flown him out to even more remote areas to stargaze— but this— this is something he’s never seen before.

It’s beyond anything he could have ever imagined.

Outside his window, lit on the underside by the sun behind it, the Earth rotates slowly on its axis. The other side is cast in shadow, and behind it, he can see the moon, and beyond that, the stars. He doesn’t think he’s ever seen them this bright, this  _ close. _

Shining brightest amongst them all, a single star. Yuuri would know it anywhere. It’s  _ Minako’s  _ star, watching over him even here, beyond the highest clouds. When he finally goes to bed, early, he falls asleep knowing that— for once— it’ll still be there when he gets up in the morning.  
  


* * *

  
Early the next day, he's interrupted during his morning shower as an alarm goes off and the room starts flashing red.

“Enemies have boarded the ship!” Viktor’s voice comes in over the speaker system, “We need you  _ now _ , Paladins!”

He shoots upright, grabs his towel, and wraps it quickly around his waist.

“Go! Go! We need you,  _ now!  _ On the bridge!”

He nearly skids heading for the door, but manages to regain his balance and sprint around the doorway. It's just two hallways down, less than a minute until he reaches the bridge. He skids through the door, clasping his towel at his waist with one hand, and falls into a battle-ready stance. It takes him a moment to process the unexpected lack of enemies.

Viktor is standing near the console in his flight suit, holding the microphone. The windscreen is clear of any enemy ships. Viktor himself looks to be in no immediate danger.

As he watches, Viktor lifts the microphone to his lips.

“Enemies are here!” he announces, “They are closing in on the bridge!”

He looks to the time on the screen projected in front of him. A flash of irritation comes over his face. He lifts the microphone again.

“Alas!” he cries loudly, clasping a hand to his chest, “Have you forsaken me, Paladins? After all I've done for you? I require immediate assistance!”

“Your Highness,” Yuuri cuts in then, flatly.

Viktor jumps, whipping around, and pauses with his mouth still open. His eyes draw down from Yuuri’s naked shoulders, to his toweled waist, to his bare feet, and back up again. Yuuri flushes, suddenly conscious of the fact that only a very small towel is protecting the scant remainder of his fast-evaporating modesty.

“Why are you—” Viktor begins.

Phichit stumbles in, still bleary-eyed and in his pajamas. He looks like he's basically still asleep. Yuuri’s lived with him for years. He knows what Phichit looks like when he's sleeping standing up, and this is it.

The boy in question blinks once, twice, before he squints in confusion.

“Why,” he asks, slowly, “are you naked?”

Yuuri just puts his face in his hands.

 

 

Mila trips in through the door some three minutes later. Viktor’s pulled up a chair at the console, and Phichit’s sitting on the floor nearby. Yuuri has opted to remain standing. He really doesn’t think the towel will cover anything if he sits on the floor.

Mila blinks a few times as she takes it all in.

“Is there not an attack?” she asks, confused.

“No,” Viktor admits, and looks again to the time projected in front of him, “Where’s Yuri and Chris?”

Yuuri and Phichit sigh as he raises the microphone again.

“Mila has been taken captive!” he announces, “Defeat is imminent!”

Mila just blinks, and then seems to accept the situation for what it is with no further comment. She settles down beside Phichit to wait the exercise out.

 

 

It takes about a minute longer for Yuri to stroll in.

“So there isn't an attack,” he grumbles.

“And it's a good thing there wasn't!” Viktor reprimands, “You took ten minutes in all to get to the bridge. If there  _ had  _ been an enemy attack, I’d be dead!”

“Good riddance,” Yuri says.

Viktor ignores him.

“Look at you!” he chides, gesturing at them all, “None of you are in your flight suits, Yurio just strolled in, and Chris hasn't even bothered to show up!”

“Probably could tell it was just bad acting,” Yuri interjects.

Viktor ignores him again.

“The universe is relying on all of you to protect her. Please take your job seriously!”

He sighs, clearly disappointed, before he turns to nod at Yuuri.

“You made good time, Paladin,” he admits, “Well done.” He pauses then, eyes dropping briefly. “Just— maybe come in clothes next time, okay?”

Yuuri closes his eyes and counts slowly backward from ten. He’s blaming this on Phichit. This is Phichit’s fault. This is  _ all Phichit’s fault.  _ He’d thought he’d been safe from Phichit’s last shenanigan, but  _ no,  _ here he is, naked to the world once again. Phichit is clearly thinking something along the same lines, because he’s snickering quietly behind one hand.

“Well,” Viktor continues, “I doubt Chris is coming. The exercise is over.” He smiles a sickly sweet smile. “I'll be preparing more exercises to test your abilities and hone your skills. You lot are a lot more mediocre than you think.”

Then, he  _ finally _ puts the microphone away. Yuuri can’t help the relief that comes with that.

“For the rest of today, feel free to familiarize yourself with the Castle premises. Training begins tomorrow. See you then.”

He turns and swans out of the room.

“Right,” Yuuri says, “And I'm going to go and put some clothes on. Good morning to you all.”

He turns and exits as well.  
  


* * *

 

  
The Castle, he soon finds out, is strange, but lovely, and also unexpectedly dangerous.

The first he finds out when he stumbles into the kitchen, to discover that all of the Castle’s food comes out of  _ hoses. _

“Food goo!” a young Balmeran boy explains, small-framed and wearing a mechanic’s hat a size too large for him. His name is Guang Hong, and he’s one of the Castle’s mechanics. He'd been in there fixing one of the dispensers. Apparently Alteans live on a liquid diet or something.

His first dangerous encounter comes soon after that, upon exploring the training room. There’s all the equipment characteristic of a standard military training facility, and then some. One of the facilities is a holographic simulator, which brings up a projection of a featureless warrior carrying a pole arm. He watches, curious, as it swings a few times, figuring that it’s used to aid in learning a particular fighting style. He doesn't move as it swings at him. It is, after all, only a projection, right?

Wrong.

It takes a slice of skin off his left shoulder, and he spends the next five frenzied minutes running from it, unarmed, as he attempts to figure out how to turn it off. The nightmare only ends when the Castle’s engineer, a young Galra named Leo, steps in for a routine maintenance check.

He then heads off to med bay to get his shoulder dressed, on Leo’s insistence, despite it being only a surface wound. There, he meets the stoic doctor, a young Korean man named Seung Gil, and his two assistants, a quiet Kazakhstani boy named Otabek, and a strange, loud Canadian who introduces himself as simply JJ.

Once he’s done getting patched up, he goes looking for his Lion.

The thing is he can feel her, like there's a thread between them pulling him towards her. And so it's not long until he finds her in one of the hangars, laid on her belly with her mouth open. Her mouth apparently opens into the cockpit.

The moment he sits, the chair moves, recalibrating to fit his height and reach perfectly.

“Hello,” he whispers, into the silence of the cockpit, and gets a— a sort of  _ ping _ in return, “Wanna go flying with me?”

The controls begin to light up, engines whirring all around him.

He laughs.

“Okay.”

He takes her on a joyride through a nearby asteroid belt, ducking and leaping and rolling through the debris, tumbling smoothly, whooping as he goes. In the midst of a lazy barrel roll, he gets a vivid image.

It's Minako, but younger than he's ever seen her, laughing with her hair blowing in her face.

Then, he's hit by a deep pang of melancholy.

“You miss her,” he says.

He gets another image.

It's a photograph. A photograph of  _ him _ , as a baby. He knows for a fact that Minako has that photo framed on her bedside back on Earth.

“That's me,” he tells the Lion.

A warm feeling in his chest. Somehow, he thinks the Lion had known that all along. Another image pops into mind, a familiar one this time. It's the first one he'd gotten, right before he'd been Chosen— a woman in profile, looking down at a small photograph, hair falling to cover her face. Realization hits him then.

It's Minako, looking at the photograph of him.

He's getting an air of protectiveness from the Lion now. It takes him a moment, but he realizes that it's directed at  _ him.  _ The Lion is feeling protective of him, and that touches him somewhere deep.

And so he decides to give his Lion something in return. He closes his eyes, and thinks hard of Minako, older, with wrinkles around her mouth and the beginnings of grey in her hair. He thinks hard about the best night of his childhood, until it's like he can hear the waves lapping against the sides of the boat again, can see the individual strands of Minako’s hair blowing across her collar as she gazes up at the stars.

There’s a moment of nothing, then a profound gratefulness blooms warm and full in his chest. He smiles shyly at the sensation.

“You're welcome,” he whispers.

They sit out in open space together for another half an hour while he savors the stars. He doesn't know any of them, but he recalls the ones from Earth with the most interesting stories, and tells them aloud in the silence of the cockpit. He doesn’t get anything back from his Lion, but he can tell she’s listening. Finally, as a nearby sun starts coming out from behind the Balmera, he flies them back to the Castle.

As he’s nearing the Castle, he thinks he sees a flash of silver in one of the windows. When he looks again, there’s no one there.  
  


* * *

  
The next day, they begin training for real. Viktor had flown them into the vast emptiness until he’d found a planet with no sentient life on it, and then landed there. The planet they are now on is an endless desert, just sand and sand for as far as they can see, with not even a single plant or animal in sight.

Up in the Castle, Viktor stands before all of them on the bridge, frowning down at a list in his hands.

“So,” he's saying, “The most important hurdle every new team of Paladins must overcome is forming Voltron. Forming Voltron isn't just a physical phenomenon, it is also an emotional and spiritual experience. You can't just  _ do _ it, you need to _ feel _ it.”

He taps his pencil consideringly against his clipboard.

“Last night,” he continues, “I was thinking.”

“That's rare,” Yuri interjects.

“I was thinking,” Viktor says, louder, “Of exercises you could do as a team, to help you form Voltron. And I wrote a list!”

_ That _ explains the list he’s holding.

Viktor claps his hands impatiently.

“So get in your Lions and get out onto the field!” he orders, “I specially landed the Castle for this very purpose!”

 

 

Ten minutes later, they're all in their flight suits and out in their Lions. Viktor’s face is projected to Yuuri’s left in the cockpit, above all the controls and buttons.

“Alright,” he says, “Are you all ready for the first exercise? We’ll start easy and go harder, until you learn to form Voltron!”

“Yes,” comes Phichit’s voice.

“We’re ready,” Mila chimes.

“Alright,” Viktor says again. There's a couple seconds of silence. Then—

“I lied,” Viktor says matter-of-factly, “I couldn't think of anything, so I'm just going to set the Castle defences on you.”

A particle barrier comes up around the Castle, and the cannons around its towers begin to fire up red.

“But I believe in you, Paladins!” Viktor trills, “The thrill of battle! The solidarity of a common enemy! The necessity of forming Voltron will surely guide the way!”

_ “Viktor!”  _ Yuri is hollering,  _ “You absolute nutcase!” _

The Castle begins to fire on them, and they are immediately split up. A laser narrowly misses Phichit, who’s flying haphazardly, spinning and tumbling.

Yuuri can hear him screaming over the radio.

“This is my first time flying a plane!” he’s screeching through the wordless screaming, “This is  _ not  _ the right way to  _ learn!” _

Mila is screaming her head off too, and Yuri is howling profanities. Chris— Chris is  _ laughing,  _ the goddamned sadistic  _ bastard.  _ He's laughing so hard he's gasping.

“What now, fearless leader?” he manages through his laughter, and it takes Yuuri a moment to realize that Chris is talking to  _ him. _

Right. Black Paladin. He's in charge.

“We need to stick together.”

“But we don't know how to fly!” Mila and Phichit howl.

“I was a cargo pilot, sweetheart,” Chris adds, “I’m no better at dodging these things.”

Yuuri notices for the first time that he's actually just flying in loops around the Castle, taking damage as he goes.

But Yuri, on the other hand, is already converging with him.

Yuuri peers down at the ground below.

“Look at the furrows in the sand,” he directs, “The cannons fires in the same line in constant intervals. Avoid them. They don't move.”

“Smart,” Viktor comes in then, winking on the screen, “Thanks for bringing that to my attention. I left them on the wrong setting. Time to change things up.”

And with a whirr, the cabins begin to  _ move _ — to fresh screams.

“They’re set to follow us now,” Yuuri yells over the din, “They can sense motion! Fly in zig-zags towards me and Yuri!”

The radio is still being overrun by Mila and Phichit’s screams, but their Lions are beginning to converge. Finally, they are all flying side-by-side.

“Fly in formation!” Yuuri yells.

“ _ What  _ formation?!” Yuri screams back.

“I—” Yuuri begins, “You know the one! The one we  _ always _ see them flying in — _ in the cartoons!” _

“You’ve got to be kidding me.”

Yuuri flushes.

“You have a better idea?” he shoots back through his embarrassment.

No one voices further objection. The others pull back, and he pulls forward, until they are flying in V-formation.

“That's it!” Viktor is yelling over the radio, “Now feel the connection! Forming Voltron is a spiritual and emotional task! Don't forget that!”

Yuuri flies in silence for a few moments.

“What,” Yuri says flatly — and Yuuri has never related more to him than he does now.

There's an even longer silence as they all continue flying in a straight line without speaking.

“Are you guys feeling and connecting?” Viktor asks crossly.

Yuuri closes his eyes and counts to five.

“Your highness,” he sighs, “With all due respect—”

“You come up with terrible ideas!” Yuri shouts.

“Please turn the lasers off,” Yuuri continues, “We need to figure this out another way. Can you  _ please  _ let up for  _ just  _ one minute?”

“A rogue army coming to destroy us all will  _ not  _ ‘let up’, as you've put it, to let you figure this out,” Viktor says, with a closed-eyed smile, “Do you really think you have that luxury?”

He raises his wrist to inspect a non-existent watch.

“Well, will you look at the time,” he says mildly, “I need to go feed Makka. You can come back in once you form Voltron and take down the Castle defences.”

“Makkachin is a robot!” Yuri screams, “She doesn't need to be fed!”

“See you soon, Paladins!”

The projection of Viktor cuts out. The cannons begin to beam lasers in random patterns, changing up every ten seconds.

Yuuri closes his eyes as the screams start up again.  
  


* * *

  
They step back onto the bridge two hours later.

Viktor perks up. He’s sitting in one of the chairs with a metal chew-toy in his hands. There’s a robot dog rolling around at his feet for belly rubs, letting out distressed mechanical whines at his sudden distraction. It’s all very, very strange.

“So you managed to form Voltron?” Viktor asks, delighted.

No one replies for a long moment.

At the back of the room, Leo’s tinkering with something that’s fizzing and clicking, head buried in the circuitry, with an open tool-box at his feet. Guang Hong is standing by the tool-box, nodding very seriously and attentively as Leo explains what he’s doing in an undertone, occasionally passing him tools from the box.

“The lasers stopped after a while and the barrier came down,” Chris finally admits.

“What!” Viktor cries, upset, “Why!”

“Oh,” Leo says, and pulls his head out of his work for a moment, to raise a finger in sheepish apology, “I was running a routine scan on the core engine and just restarted all of the Castle’s systems. Didn’t know you had the defences set up, Your Highness, so I left it turned off.”

Viktor looks very put out, but Phichit— Phichit is crying  _ actual  _ tears of gratitude. He stumbles, zombie-like, over to the Galra, and hugs him. The shoulders of his flight-suit are smoking steadily.

“Thank you,” he whispers, with feeling.

“Well,” Leo says, looking very confused, “You’re welcome?”

Viktor  _ tsks _ .

“Well then let’s forget about the Castle defences,” he sighs, and turns to rummage for something behind his chair.

He produces a clipboard with a serene smile.

“I came up with an  _ actual  _ list of team-building exercises while you were out there! We can try those instead!”

“No!” everyone shouts in unison.

Yuuri just puts a hand over his eyes as the room dissolves into yelling.  
  


* * *

  
Viktor wrangles them into doing his team-building exercises in the end. Yuuri had had front-row seats to watch, open-mouthed, as unstoppable force met immovable object. Immovable object had won. Phichit had whimpered and wobbled around Viktor for ten whole minutes, but Viktor had remained cheerfully unfazed.

And so they are forced into the first of Viktor’s set of exercises.

“Partner up!” Viktor instructs, “One of you will be blindfolded, and the other will guide you verbally through the maze. If you hit the walls, you will receive a small shock. Don't worry, it won't hurt.”

Viktor pauses.

“Well,” he backtracks, “It won’t hurt  _ too  _ much.”

“Walk two steps forward and then one step left,” Mila instructs, five minutes later.

Yuri follows without hesitation, and yelps as he’s promptly shocked.

_ “Hey!” _

Mila winces.

“Sorry, you have short legs,” she apologizes, “Take one more step forward, and then left.”

Yuri does so, and is promptly shocked again.

_ “You’re doing this on purpose!” _

“Sorry, I meant right,” Mila says, and then, “No, wait, left. Wait— is this my left or my right?”

Mila raises her right hand.

“That’s your right,” Phichit whispers.

Yuri snatches his blindfold from his face and throws it down angrily. It flutters serenely from his hand, back and forth, descending slowly to the floor. That just seems to make him angrier.

“I'm not doing this anymore!” he yells, stomping on his blindfold.  


 

 

For the second time in a day, Yuuri gets to watch, open-mouthed, as unstoppable force meets immovable object. Immovable object wins again. But this time, the immovable object isn’t Viktor. 

It all erupts in a great deal of yelling — Yuri is a very loud person by nature — but by the end the outcome is clear. Yuri says that he isn’t doing it anymore, and  _ yes Viktor! That means he isn’t doing it anymore! _

And so they move on, with a great deal of reluctance on Viktor’s part, to the second exercise.

“In this exercise,” Viktor announces, “You must learn to trust one another to cover your backs. You will stand in a circle, facing outwards, each armed with a staff. You must not let any of the projectiles hit you, or pass your guard to hit your teammates in the back. That means no ducking, okay? On your mark—”

The thing is, Yuuri knows Phichit. He's quick on his feet, but he’s also impulsive and has absolutely no depth perception. Playing racket sports with Phichit in close quarters is a very intensely frightening situation.

In the first second of the exercise, Phichit steps forward and takes a massive swing at an incoming projectile with the front end of his staff. The back end goes over Chris’ head, the Galra having had the good reflexes to duck. Phichit misses, predictably, and the paintball hits him squarely in the chest. Another flies over Chris’ bent head and hits Mila in the back.

The floor opens beneath them, and they both fall through, screaming the whole way down.

“Oops,” Chris says, turning to look over his shoulder.

Yuuri and Yuri move in unison to intercept the paintball coming for his unguarded front.

“Watch your front!” Yuri yells, and is promptly hit in the face by a projectile coming in from the side. The floor opens up.

He goes down with a long, angry scream.

Yuuri darts far out of his reach to compensate for their abrupt loss of teammate, and misses. The next ball hits Chris in the back.

Yuuri closes his eyes as Chris falls through the ground with a lot less screaming, just a surprised  _ oh _ , and raises his hands slowly in the air in surrender. A moment later, something hard hits him from behind, and then he's falling too.

It's over in ten seconds flat.

“I'll hope you know,” Viktor says, very sweetly, below, “That this exercise was set to a difficulty level _ fit for an Altean child.” _

“Yuri _ is _ an Altean child,” Chris points out.

“I am not a child!” Yuri screeches.

“It doesn’t matter!” Viktor yells,  _ “The rest of you are not even remotely children!”  
_

 

 

They move on, with a lot less yelling, to the third and final exercise.

“If this won’t do it,” Viktor says stonily, “I don’t know what will.”

On Viktor’s orders, they’d all changed into their flight suits and gotten into their Lions. They are each hovering in the air over an empty plot of land. It’s just sand dunes for miles below them. The blindfolds from the first exercise have made a re-emergence. Yuuri is looking down at his a little apprehensively.

Viktor can’t be expecting them to fly  _ blindfolded,  _ can he?

“This is a test of trust between you and your Lion,” Viktor announces over the comms, “You will enter into a nosedive, blindfolded. You must tap into the bond between you and your Lion. Your Lion will serve as your eyes.  _ It _ will tell you when to pull up. Ready?”

Well, Yuuri thinks, and ties his blindfold on.

“Go!”

“I have a bad feeling about this,” Phichit says, as they tip over into a nosedive.

“Me too,” Mila whispers.

“Scared?” Yuri taunts.

“Are you,  _ little boy?” _ Christophe returns with an audible smirk.

“Shut up and connect with your Lions,” Yuuri snaps.

A few more seconds of wind whistling past their ears as Yuuri tries to focus on the thread between him and his Lion, then—

_ “Nope!”  _ Phichit shouts.

Yuuri can hear the jets of his Lion firing as he pulls up.

_ “Double nope!”  _ Mila screams two seconds later.

He can hear her pulling up too, but he pushes that aside, trying to focus—  _ focus.  _ A small  _ ping  _ from his Lion, and he tries desperately to grab onto that until—

“Well, I’m not feeling anything from this thing,” Chris adds casually — right before a loud  _ crash. _

“What was that?” Yuuri demands, losing contact with his Lion again, “Did someone crash?”

A few more seconds of shallow breathing in the silence of his cockpit, then he breaks, jamming the gear stick back and pulling up sharply.

“I hear the sound of a coward, a chicken, a—”

Yuri’s taunting is cut off by a second crash.

Yuuri pulls his blindfold off. Chris and Yuri’s Lions are stuck head-first in the sand below. Mila and Phichit are hovering  _ high, _ high above. Viktor is looking at all of them very crossly over the screen, shaking his head slowly.  


 

 

“Dinner,” Viktor sighs disappointedly, “And then we can try again tomorrow.”

“Finally,” Phichit groans, and clambers eagerly into his seat at the table.

The rest of them settle into their chairs with varying groans, grumbles, and sighs. There’s a full spread of— well,  _ goo,  _ on plates all over the table. Goo in varying colors, consistency, and texture, but ultimately, still goo. Yuuri really doesn’t understand the Altean palate.

Viktor just smiles sweetly, as everyone prepares to dig in anyway, before he snaps his fingers. Energy cuffs spring up around their wrists, tying them to wrists of the person sitting on either side of them.

“Before that, though,” he continues cheerfully, “I thought we could turn dinner into a teachable moment about teamwork!”

“I’ll show  _ you  _ a teachable moment!” Yuri shouts, and flings a handful of food goo at Viktor, yanking Mila’s arm with him.

Viktor ducks, with a scandalized look, and it hits the wall behind him.

“Food fight!” Mila screams, and splats a handful of goo into Yuri's cheek.

“You're supposed to be throwing that at Viktor, you hag!” the boy yells, and up-ends his plate over her head.

As food begins to fly, Yuuri slides slowly and discreetly under the table. Phichit, however, is having none of that, and yanks him back up by their connected wrists. Yuuri vainly attempts to cross his wrists over his head as the battle-cries break out, but they are quickly yanked away by his adjacent teammates.

It's five whole minutes of Armageddon, Yuuri hunching over with his eyes shut tight throughout it all, until someone begins to chuckle. Someone else giggles, and then suddenly, the whole table is breaking out in abrupt, hysterical laughter.

“Look at Viktor!” Chris manages through his laughter.

“Oh, shut it,” Viktor shoots back, running a hand self-consciously through his hair and only making it worse. He’s flushed from laughing, eyes sparkling, and stained different colors from head to toe. Yuuri can't help but burst into laughter at the sight. Viktor's so pale, so fair-haired, and dressed completely in white— he'd made the perfect canvas for their food fight.

Viktor looks up at his laughter, stares, and slowly begins to chuckle. It breaks into laughter, and he quickly claps a hand over his mouth to stifle it.

“Look what you all did to Yuuri!”

Phichit turns to him, and begins to laugh too. He reaches over to smear one finger down Yuuri’s cheek. It comes away completely coated.

“You've become a food goo monster!” he cries, delighted.

“Because he just let everyone hit him,” Yuri pants, breathlessly.

He’s flushed too, eyes bright. His hair is sticking up in every direction from the goo, and he’s got a big smear on his cheek.

Yuuri can’t help the smile pulling at his lips, and soon he’s laughing too. He reaches to pull Yuri into a quick side-hug, filled with a strange and inexplicable fondness for the boy. He really is just a teenager after all.

Finally, he lets go of Yuri and pulls his forearm over his face to get the worst of the mess off, pushing his hand back through his hair. He flicks the resulting glob of goo on his hand to the floor.

“Alright, team,” he says fondly, shaking his head, “Bed, and tomorrow we’ll start afresh okay?”

A couple more chuckles.

“Yeah, okay.”  
  


* * *

  
The next morning, he’s interrupted again in the midst of his morning shower.

“Enemy ships have been spotted on the horizon,” Viktor shouts breathlessly through the speakers, “Everyone in their Lions  _ now!” _

He blinks, then reaches slowly for his towel, and begins to dry himself off normally. He wraps the towel around his waist to change in his room.

“Enemies are here!” Viktor yells as Yuuri is entering his room, “I’m serious! Get  _ down  _ here!”

He is just beginning to pull on his flight suit when the whole Castle rocks with some kind of impact. 

“An enemy ship has just fired a first shot on the Castle’s particle barrier,” Viktor screams, “Get out there and defend the Castle!”

Fuck, Yuuri thinks, and begins hopping more urgently into his pants.

A second explosion rocks the Castle.

_ “Paladins!” _

Fuck. Fuck.  _ Fuck. _ It isn’t an exercise.

He’s up above the Castle in record time. Descending quickly upon them is a massive battleship, unmarked, and buzzing with drones that are firing at the Castle. The Castle defenses are taking a fair number of them down, and he helps to clear some of them with a swat of his Lion’s paw, but there are too many of them. He’s taking damage on all sides.

A red blur erupts from the castle and slams right into him. A second later, he hears the unmistakable roar of an ion cannon firing past him, hitting the Castle’s particle barrier with a cacophonous noise.

“Watch your back!” Yuri yells, “Another battleship is approaching.”

Yuuri looks behind him, in the direction the cannon blast had come from, and true enough, a second ship is looming up on the horizon.

“What the fuck?” Yuuri mutters, “What the  _ fuck?  _ Who  _ are  _ they?”

“Anti-Voltron terrorist forces,” Viktor comes in, pale-faced and flickering, and then more crossly, “Did you think I wasn’t being serious about the rogue army coming to destroy us? You all know we’ve been having a terrorist problem!”

“No, Viktor,” Yuri interjects incredulously,  _ “No one thought you were being serious!” _

Yuuri is just about to tell them off for arguing during a battle when—

“I see one more battleship coming in from the east.” — Phichit.

“Another on the west.” — Mila

“Bad news, there’s one northside too.” —  _ Chris. _

“What kind of rogue terrorist group has a fleet of _ five battleships?” _ Yuuri demands incredulously.

“And a gazillion drones!” Yuri adds.

“I don’t know,” Viktor admits, blanching, “There hasn’t been an attack this large in  _ decades.” _

“We should have stayed on Arus,” Yuri snarls, but his voice is shaking, “The Altean army can’t help us here.”

“But we didn’t,” Viktor snaps, “We’re out here now, and there’s no one coming to help us. You need to form Voltron,  _ now,  _ and take down those battleships. The Castle is strong, but there’s only so many blasts the particle barrier can take from those ion cannons before it falls, leaving the Castle defenceless!”

“Newsflash! We don’t know  _ how  _ to form Voltron!”

“But we’ve got to try,” Yuuri inserts firmly. “Everyone converge over the castle, quickly.”

He can see the other Lions pulling around and coming towards them. He takes a few deep breaths, centering himself. Yuri is shooting at the drones from beside him, but he stops as the others draw near, and pulls around to come from behind him.

“Same formation as yesterday,” he says, sounding calmer than he actually feels.

“I’m scared,” Mila whispers.

Another cacophonous roar, and two beams hit the Castle, one after the other. The particle barrier flickers. A third and fourth ship are charging up their cannons, even as the drones fire on their Lions.

“We can only take one more hit,” Viktor says.

They’re still flying in formation, but nothing’s happening.

A third blow rocks the castle. The barrier flickers again, then begins to chip slowly away.

“We’re defenceless,” Viktor updates, biting his lip.

There’s a fifth ship firing up now.

“Fly between the cannons and the Castle,” Yuuri orders numbly, “We can’t let it hit them.”

He can sense the others’ unease, but they follow without a word. On the projection to his left, Viktor is watching on with wide, worried eyes as they change trajectory to put themselves in the line of the cannon’s blast. Yuuri stares straight ahead, right down the barrel of the ion cannon, flaring blue as it powers up. They are still flying in formation— right into the eye of the cannon.

“Paladins,” Viktor says suddenly, “Sacrifice the Castle. The universe can lose one Altean prince, but it can’t lose Voltron. Escape and get to the Altean army on Arus. I think— I think I have enough to open a wormhole for you to escape. Just—”

“No!” they all shout in unison.

Yuuri frowns as the rest of the team begins to clamor. Something’s happening. He can feel his Lion reaching out, but she’s not reaching to  _ him. _

“What’s gotten into you?” Chris is scolding.

“We’re not just abandoning you!” Phichit agrees.

Yuuri closes his eyes. She’s still reaching out. But now— he can feel something reaching  _ back. _

“You’re a shit prince,” Yuri is shouting.

The cannon roars ahead of them.

“But you’re  _ our _ prince!” the boy yells,  _ “So we’re going down together!” _

Yuuri feels the moment it all clicks together.

He opens his eyes as a brightness overtakes them. He can hear his Lion resonating with the other Lions— a single unwavering chord, playing together in perfect harmony.

“What’s happening?” Mila asks, with wonderment.

His Lion shudders with impact. He sees red against his right. Another shudder. Green on his left. Mechanical whirrs fill his cockpit as they connect, adjusting to become one whole. The light begins to fade. They stare down into the barrel of the charging cannon, but this time, they are one.

“Mila,” he says, “Shield.”

A left arm comes forward, green, and a shield roars to life in front of them just as the cannon blast releases. He feels the impact of it down to his bones, but the shield holds, the blast dissipating around it like an avalanche.

“Oh my god,” Viktor whispers, in the ensuing silence.

“Oh my  _ god!”  _ Phichit screeches, “I’m a  _ leg!” _

Yuuri can’t help but knock his head back against his headrest, laughing low and shaky. His hands are shaking too, on the gearstick, cold with sweat. He feels a little weak all over from the force of his relief.

“Yes, Phichit,” he says, still chuckling weakly, “And I’m the head of this giant humanoid robot.”

“Oh my god!” Phichit screams giddily, “This is _ so cool!” _

Yuuri shakes his head, trying to get back into battle mode. No time for relief, now.

“Yuri,” he commands quietly, “Sword. Let’s finish this, yeah?”

“Yeah,” Yuri says.

A click, and a right arm comes around, red and drawing a sword from seemingly nowhere.

The blade slices easily through the underside of the first battleship, like a hot knife through butter. One down. They move on to the next, slicing it diagonally open, and then pivot in unison, flying up and towards the others. Two down.

The two ships explode beneath them.

The nearest ship is charging its cannon again, this time aiming it at  _ them.  _ With a quick thrust, they slice the cannon from the ship. The blast kicks back into an explosion, and the ship begins to plummet. Three down.

They take the last two ships out in one fell swoop, sword carving through steel in one long easy slice across and out. The ships explode in a burst of flames and screaming metal as Voltron flies up and away.

As the explosions settle, Yuuri looks out over the ravaged landscape. The drones are still buzzing around, firing haphazardly without their command center.

A long beam of light sweeps across them all with a dull roar.

He watches them disintegrate to pieces in the blast.

“Thought I’d help you out with the last of them,” Viktor chirps, his voice still trembling slightly.

“Haha!” Mila laughs, “We did it!”

The rest of their celebratory noises begin to come in over the comms. Yuri is yelling again. Phichit is whooping. Chris is just laughing, low and easy. A slow smile begins to spread over Yuuri’s face as the realisation settles over him too. They’d  _ done it. _

Viktor clears his throat, chuckling lowly.

“Good work, Paladins, I’m—”

He swallows, and then a heart-shaped smile blooms slowly onto his face.

“I am so,  _ so  _ proud of you,” he says, beaming.  
  


* * *

  
That night, they all assemble in the dining hall, sitting along the long table with Viktor at the head. He’s got a set of papers with him, which he sets down wordlessly on the table. The celebratory air from before has long-cleared. It’s strictly business now.

“That wasn’t a terrorist attack,” is what Viktor begins with, “The scale of it was too large.” He laughs, nervously. “I don’t know what to say,” he admits, and shakes his head, “We— we haven’t seen an organized attack of such scale since the fall of the Galra Empire  _ more than two centuries ago.” _

“Those battleships were military-grade,” Phichit contributes, eyes wide and concerned, “In fact, they were the exact same make as the ones we used at the Garrison.”

Viktor nods.

“And that’s where the bad news comes in,” he says, “The battleships and drones that attacked us were standard military equipment, of the sort only produced in Arus, and only sold to governments for military purposes —  even then, they are  _ only _ sold to those party to the Voltron Peace Treaty.”

He takes a deep breath.

“We have a traitor government on our hands, and a big one at that.”

He lays out the stack of papers on the table. It’s a list. It states all of the governments party to the Voltron Peace Treaty, and the size of their military fleets. Seven of them are circled in red.

“These are the only governments with an independent military large enough to launch an attack of that size,” Viktor explains, and he reads, “Altea—”

Yuri begins to protest, but Viktor just continues to read over him.

“Olkarion, Earth—”

Yuuri looks up. Phichit tenses. Sara is frowning at the side.

“Mamora, Naxzela—”

Chris frowns too, looking contemplative. Leo looks to Chris, and their eyes meet over the table.

“— Taujeer, and Tundra.”

Mila is biting her lip.

“Those are some pretty powerful governments,” she notes uneasily.

Viktor nods unhappily.

“This was a planned attack,” he says, “They struck when they knew Voltron would be weakest, when the new Paladins had just taken over the Lion. They knew we were unprepared. They timed that attack perfectly.”

“But how do we find out which one’s the traitor?” Yuri asks.

There’s a moment of quiet. Mila is fidgeting, shooting an uneasy look up at Viktor. Chris is still looking contemplative. Yuri tenses as the silence draws on. But Phichit, Phichit is looking right at Yuuri, and Yuuri knows just what he’s thinking.

“Every military drone or ship that’s activated upon production gets a tag assigned to it,” Yuuri comes in, “Each government database knows where all its ships are, where each and every drone is.”

“If we run a stealth mission on each of those seven planets,” Phichit continues, “I can hack into the records and see if any of them happen to contain five rogue ships, coming out here into the middle of nowhere.”

“And we’ll have our culprit in a matter of two weeks,” Yuuri finishes smugly, and reaches over the table to high-five Phichit, “Maybe even sooner, depending on how quickly the Castle can take us between planets.”

Mila looks more set at ease now, and Chris is nodding along with their plan.

But Viktor is frowning.

“We might have to extend that timeline,” he admits unhappily, “The Council wants us back on Arus.”

And now it’s Yuuri’s turn to frown.

“What for?”

Viktor’s jaw tightens.

“Ascension,” he says, “Each member state will have an ascension ceremony for the new Paladins, and Voltron needs to be there. We’ll be passing through the seven suspects for sure, but we’ll also be passing through  _ every other planet _ in the Voltron Alliance. It’s going to take at least a month. Probably three. We have more members than we did the last time round.”

“How is that useful in any way?” Yuri grinds out, sounding frustrated.

Viktor shrugs.

“It’s politics,” he says.

“Can we tell the Council about the attack?” Phichit asks, looking bewildered, “I’m sure they’ll understand the  _ urgency—” _

But Viktor shakes his head.

“I contacted them already,” he reveals, “They dismissed it as a particularly large terrorist attack.”

“That was no terrorist attack,” Yuri growls.

Viktor just shrugs helplessly, as the rest dissolve into displeased murmuring. Yuuri can’t help but feel sorry for him. He looks like he doesn’t have a choice in the matter either, and is just as unhappy about it all.

“Okay,” Yuuri says, raising his hands, before tensions can escalate too much, “Okay, so this isn’t ideal, but we can work with it.”

He turns to look at Viktor, who’s shooting him a grateful look.

“Politics is dumb. It always is,” he continues, “But Voltron isn’t just about fighting bad guys, it’s also about diplomacy.”

That's what Minako had always said to him.

Viktor is nodding along now, looking relieved.

“Very well-said,” he agrees, “And absolutely right. It’s not ideal, but we do need to fulfill some diplomatic duties. We’ll just have to do our investigating along the way.”

Yuri is still grumbling, but the rest of them seem to take that to heart, shrugging a little or just nodding. Even Yuri, despite his grumbling, doesn’t look as displeased as he had been moments ago.

Viktor smiles, looking pleased.

“Let’s take it easy, shall we all?” he chuckles, “Let’s take these two months to get to know each other better.”

“Team-bonding!” Phichit yells, jumping to his feet, complete with jazz hands.

“Training too,” Yuuri adds.

“And at the end of that two months,” Yuri continues with a fierce grin, “We’ll be ready to kick some bad-guy butt.”

“Yeah!” Mila agrees, and pulls him into a headlock, ruffling his hair.

Yuuri smiles over his shrieks, shaking his head as Mila turns the headlock into a hug, and Phichit tackles them both. He reaches out briefly to pull Chris into the group hug too, before he locks eyes with Yuuri over their heads.

“Oh, come over here, you!” he calls.

With a laugh, Yuuri goes.  
  


* * *

  
In the dark of his room that night, Yuuri curls up by the window and looks out to the stars.

He can’t see Minako’s star any longer, but the stars are burning brighter than he has ever seen before. He looks out at the ones trailing smoothly past them as the ship sails steadily for Arus, and doesn’t recognize any of them. They are in a whole new star system. These are not the same stars that Minako had traced out for him all those years ago.

But he traces patterns in the stars anyway, patterns that just come to him— a bear here, an archer there, a man praying on his knees. He traces new patterns in the sky, and creates his own stories for them, whispering them to himself in the silence of his room. He can see so many, so bright, extending so far and so clear into the distance that the whole sky is just a single glittering canvas.

He puts his palm flat against the window.

This is the closest he’s gotten, yet, to the stars.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I try to make this fic understandable even if you haven't read Voltron yet. However, I don't actually have a beta, so if you came across any part that confused you or made you feel like you were lacking some kind of background info, please do leave a comment telling me about it.


	3. schmoozing, screaming, & ill-advised dancing

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I was supposed to upload this some weeks back but I just kind of forgot omg so I was just plodding along my semester thinking "I feel like I've forgotten something but idk what"?
> 
> UPDATE: I uploaded the wrong version of this at first and it was up for like 2 mins or something. I hope no one read it during that time.

New Altea is beautiful in the same way Viktor is: all chiseled angles and seamless marble, somewhat remote in its beauty. Their first day on Arus, they spend the first half of the day just wandering the vast grounds of the New Altean palace. Viktor disappears for most of the day, and when they run into him at lunchtime, Yuuri almost doesn’t recognize him.

He’s swathed in formal robes, robes that are just layers upon layers of heavy-looking fabric, painstakingly embroidered in ornate gold detailing. His silver hair is down for once, and he’s wearing a princely circlet that Yuuri’s never seen him wear. He looks almost as if the mere act of standing up in those heavy fabrics is tiring him.

“Yuuri,” he says, surprised.   
  
A bunch of old men begin to trail out of the banquet hall behind him, speaking to each other in undertones. All of them wear similar white robes.

“Your Highness,” one of them calls as he passes, impatient and faintly disapproving— Yuuri dislikes him immediately. “We will be late for the next meeting.”

Some displeased muttering issues from the group at that, and some of them even turn to shoot pointedly disapproving looks backward as they continue off down the hallway. Looking vaguely stressed, Viktor nods to Yuuri, picks up his robes, and hurries off after them.

“That’s the Altean Council,” Yuri mutters at Yuuri’s confused look, and rolls his eyes, “They’re all snobs.”

In the evening, Viktor returns, dressed in his usual flight suit with his hair up in its usual ponytail. He takes them out of the palace, out of New Altea to a little tribal village in the forest. The people who live there are discernibly not Altean. They are a bunch of small yellow creatures with large horns, about half as tall as their Yuri. The village chieftain receives them with much grace. A pot of stew boils over a fire, which they sit around as the villagers perform a welcoming ceremony for them. 

“These are the local Arusians,” Viktor explains, “They are the indigenous people of Arus. Because Altea had been destroyed by the Galra Empire during its reign, the remaining Alteans had nowhere to go after the fall of the Empire. The Arusians were gracious enough to let us build New Altea on their planet.”

They mingle with the Arusians until nightfall, and return to New Altea after that. Viktor gives them a little tour of the palace, complete with cultural commentary. Yuuri is surprised to discover that the Council apparently form the Altean oligarchy. He’d always thought they merely served as advisors, and that Altea ran under a monarchic system.

“It does,” Viktor explains, when Yuuri asks, strangely clear of expression, “The Council will serve as regent until I take the throne. They are very politically experienced. They have been in power for sixty years after all.”

It sounds like something he’s had to say a lot.

“What about your dad?” Yuuri asks then, because, well—  _ sixty years,  _ and Viktor doesn’t look a day over thirty.

“They served as regent through his lifetime too. He never lived to become king.”

And that stops the conversation there.

“I’m sorry,” Yuuri blurts out, hand flying up over his mouth, and bows low, “I am _ so  _ sorry. I didn’t mean to pry.”

Viktor catches his shoulder before he can bow again, wearing a vaguely pained look.

“Please don't bow,” he says, and makes a face, “No one really does that on the Castle. You don’t have to do that either.”

“Sorry,” Yuuri says again, “It’s a cultural thing. In Japan, everyone bows to one another. It's a habit. I'm sorry.”

Viktor just shakes his head, amused.

“You sure do like apologising, don’t you?”

And he laughs.

The next day, there is a huge parade in New Altea. Dancers spin down the streets, twirling ribbons or torches around them. A marching band leads the procession with loud fanfare, a gazillion floats trailing behind them as they go, with Voltron bringing up the rear, waving sedately at the crowds that have gathered to scream and cheer. Mila and Yuri take turns to do the waving after Yuri complains in the first fifteen minutes.

“When I was Chosen to be the right hand of Voltron,” he’d complained, “I didn’t sign up for two months of making Voltron  _ wave at people!” _

“I’m a leg,” Phichit had piped up, “Me and Chris have two months of walking in store.”

And then, the  _ traitor— _

_ “Yuuri’s  _ got it easy. The head doesn’t do anything.”

And by virtue of that, he gets additional dishwashing duties for the two months. Apparently, when Viktor had first taken command of the Castle, he had strongly opposed bringing servants onto the Castle with him. There are some drones to shine the vast expanse of floors and walls in the Castle, but they have a roster for the rest of the chores.

After the parade ends, there’s a huge ball held in the New Altean palace. There are so many courses that Yuuri loses count after the first four, and a billion different forks and knives laid out in front of him. He has to count on Phichit whispering in his ear to figure out which ones to use first. Phichit, he knows, had come from some important family in Thailand, but Yuuri’s just from a small town in rural Japan. He doesn’t know anything about intergalactic diplomacy and the unnecessary amount of cutlery that comes with it.

“Why do we only have goo on the Castle?” he does ask, halfway through the meal, “I thought Alteans just lived on a liquid diet or something, but that’s clearly not the case.”

He gestures at the spread of food before them. It’s really good food too, despite coming in all sorts of weird colors and shapes.

Phichit just shrugs.

The ball goes into full swing after all the courses have been served, and the guests adjourn to a large ballroom. Phichit slips away then, a small gadget in his hand, shooting Yuuri a meaningful look before he disappears through a side-door. Yuuri remembers, with a jolt, that Altea is one of their seven suspects.

Viktor snatches him up a minute later, a photogenic smile fixed perfectly in place. 

“Diplomatic duties,” he explains in an undertone, “Let’s go introduce you to the Councillors.”

There’s a dais at the end of the ballroom set up for the Councillors to sit. However, most of them have left their seats to mingle. Viktor navigates the jungle of waltzing aristocrats with an easy expertise, pulling Yuuri along with him by the wrist.

“Remember,” he says lowly, “The correct title is Your Excellency,” before he pitches his voice higher—  _ “Your Excellency!” _

A man turns around, potbellied, balding, and with a rumpled nose that makes him look perpetually disgruntled. His smile is a mere baring of teeth.

“Your Highness,” he greets, “It’s always a pleasure to see you back on Arus.”

Viktor is beaming his photogenic smile again, the one so bright and so beautiful it’s a little hard to look at. 

“I’d like to introduce you to our new Black Paladin,” he says graciously, guiding Yuuri forward with a hand at his back, “This is Katsuki Yuuri, of Earth.”

“I see,” the Councillor says, giving Yuuri barely a glance, “It’s a pleasure.”

Something in his manner makes Yuuri think he isn’t very pleased about Yuuri at all. Yuuri can’t help but run through various speculations for why the Councillor should be displeased with him. His palms begin to sweat.

As if sensing his mounting anxiety, Viktor gives another one of his photogenic smiles and guides them away from the Councillor.

“And now I’ll leave you to enjoy the party, Your Excellency,” he calls over his shoulder, and raises his glass, “A toast to your health, and good fortune!”

Yuuri fumbles his glass to his mouth and downs his drink too.

“Are you okay?” Viktor asks him quietly, the moment they are out of earshot.

“I’m okay,” Yuuri says numbly.

Viktor looks like he’s about say something else about that, but his eye seems to catch on somebody else as he glances through the crowd. He passes their empty glasses off to a nearby waiter, and quickly snatches up another two glasses.

“We’ll talk about this later,” he mutters, before raising his voice again, “Ah, Your Excellency! I see you’re enjoying the sweetmeats!”

At a nearby table, a man turns around. This Councillor looks much like the previous one: white-haired, pot-bellied, and balding. His eyes are narrowed suspiciously, giving him a somewhat miserly look. His displeasure is even less well-hidden than the previous Councillor, and Yuuri can’t help but let his speculations run wild again. Two Councillors in a row. He can’t help but wonder what he’s doing wrong.

A short exchange and another toast later, they are heading away once more. Yuuri blanks out for most of it, unable to focus on the conversation going on around him. He wonders if that had made him seem rude, to be so quiet and distracted during that conversation _.  _ He needs to stop worrying and pay attention.

It’s just his imagination.  _ Viktor  _ is still smiling, right?

“Yuuri,” Viktor calls, and something about the way he’s saying Yuuri’s name makes him think it’s not the first time.

“Sorry,” Yuuri says, “Sorry, what were you saying?”

“You don’t look so good,” Viktor says, frowning, “Are you sure you’re okay?”

Yuuri nods stiffly. Viktor looks very unconvinced, but there’s another old man coming towards them, and from his white robes and unhappy expression, Yuuri gets the feeling he’s a Councillor too. Viktor turns away from Yuuri reluctantly.

“Good evening, Your Excellency!”

His smile is back, but it’s looking a little strained now. 

“Your Highness,” the Councillor says shortly, and then his eyes catch on Yuuri, “And is this who I think it is?”

It’s not Yuuri’s imagination. It’s really not. He’s definitely displeased.

“Katsuki Yuuri of Earth,” Viktor introduces, “An excellent pilot, and an even more excellent Paladin. He’s our new Black Paladin.”

“Hmph,” the Councillor says.

Yuuri really isn’t imagining this.

Viktor is still smiling, but his eyes are ice-cold now.

“A toast,” Viktor manages, through gritted teeth, “To your good health.”

Yuuri quickly snatches a glass up from the table and downs it. He’s starting to feel a little fuzzy along the edges from the alcohol. Not good. It just makes him even more anxious. He closes his eyes tight.

Viktor is leading him somewhere by the elbow. He blinks, slow, but everything is a blur. The room is too bright, and there are too many people talking. He closes his eyes again, following Viktor blindly, and tries to focus on his breathing.

In front of him, he can hear the sound of a door opening— and then suddenly, it’s dark and quiet. Viktor is handling him to the floor. Yuuri curls up and puts his head in his knees.

“Breathe, Yuuri,” Viktor is whispering, “Breathe.”

He breathes.

When it’s over, he looks up. Viktor is kneeling in front of him, eyes wide and concerned. They are alone on a terrace overlooking the palace gardens.

Yuuri feels abruptly embarrassed.

“Sorry,” he says.

“No, I’m sorry,” Viktor says, “I’m sorry they were all so— so  _ rude.” _

He sounds genuinely upset about it, and Yuuri can’t help but smile.

“It’s okay,” Yuuri assures him, trying to laugh it off, “There’s— well, there’s plenty about me to warrant displeasure.”

“No,” Viktor says at once, and then again,  _ “No.” _

He turns to look over his shoulder, back towards the ballroom, separated from them by just a glass door and a set of velvet curtains. When he turns back, he looks Yuuri very seriously in the eye.

“They are upset with me,” he whispers, “Very upset, and they are taking it out on you.”

“Upset with you?” Yuuri repeats, “What for?”

But Viktor just shakes his head, and sighs. He suddenly looks very tired.

“It’s just a matter of Altean politics they aren’t happy about. They’ll get over it.”

_ Altean politics? _

Yuuri doesn’t get a lot of time to wonder about it because Viktor is standing up. He quickly gets to his feet as well.

“Ah,” Viktor says wistfully, “The stars are out.”

Yuuri turns to look, and true enough, they are. Only dim floating orbs light the vast grounds surrounding the palace, and away from the brighter lights of the city, the stars shine above the gardens like a carpet of diamonds. Yuuri instinctively hones in for Minako’s star, before he realizes, again, with a tinge of homesickness, that the stars are entirely new here. He can't tell any of them apart.

“The constellations here are different from the ones of Earth,” he tells Viktor, “I don’t know the names of any of the stars here.”

Viktor turns his face up to stare into the stars, squinting for a moment, before he points straight up at the sky.

“Can you see those two stars shining really close together? One brighter than the other?”

“The one inside that diamond?” Yuuri asks, tracing the four stars he’s talking about.

“Yes.”

Viktor smiles.

“When my parents died,” he continues, “They named the brighter star after my father, and the one beside it after my mother. They were very popular with the Altean people. Everyone was very upset when they were killed, and they named those stars so that they could be immortalized together, forever, in the night sky.”

And then he laughs.

“It’s actually really silly,” he admits, “I’ve flown out to visit those two stars, separately. They are  _ light years  _ away from each other. They aren’t even in the same galaxy, which is why one is so much brighter than the other!”

Viktor continues staring out into the stars, a faraway look in his eye. He doesn’t say anything more. Yuuri just waits in respectful silence. Viktor’s face has fallen into a somewhat absent frown, tension gathering in the crease between his brows and the hard line of his mouth. Yuuri doesn't think he should interrupt any thought that could possibly be causing that expression.

Finally, Viktor blinks, and seems to come back to himself.

“Oh, but—” he laughs nervously, “Look at me go— getting all sentimental like an old man. Yurio is right. I really am getting old.”

“No,” Yuuri says quickly, “No,  _ thank you _ . It’s nice to know something about the stars out here. Otherwise, it’s just looking out and being reminded about how far away from home I am."

Viktor flushes a little faintly, and looks down at his feet. He still looks a little embarrassed when he clears his throat.

“Shall we?” he prompts, nodding back towards the ballroom, “I hate to go back in there, but we have to meet and greet with the rest of the Councillors before this night is done.”

He looks vaguely unhappy about it, and Yuuri can’t help but feel sorry for him. He seems to have to deal with them a lot in his position.

“Are all the Councillors like that?” Yuuri asks, and Viktor frowns.

“Like what?” he asks, bewildered.

“Balding,” Yuuri says bluntly.

“Well,” Viktor splutters, obviously trying to look scandalized, but failing because he looks like he’s actually sincerely considering the question. Yuuri sees the moment he comes to his answer, because it makes him laugh, leaning against the balustrade of the terrace and holding a hand over his mouth. Yuuri has noticed that he does that whenever he laughs genuinely, as if trying to hide his real smile.

“Are you okay?” he asks, but Viktor just shakes his head helplessly.

“I can’t answer that,” he manages, before he looks quickly over his shoulder towards the door, and leans in close to whisper, “But the answer is yes — just don’t tell anyone I said that.”

And now it’s Yuuri’s turn to laugh.

They have to go back in after that, but they manage to entertain themselves enough by sharing meaningful looks over the balding heads of each Councillor they meet— a little inside-joke between the two of them. By the end of the night, they’ve spoken to every single one of the Councillors. Viktor looks exhausted, and Yuuri  _ feels  _ exhausted. He’s also a little tipsy from all the toasts. From the small sway in Viktor’s gait, he thinks Viktor is too.

They stand by a cocktail fountain together tiredly, glasses in hand, watching the couples twirling lazily around the room.

“You know,” Viktor says suddenly, “This is usually where we would dance.”

“With who?” Yuuri asks— and Viktor laughs.

“With each other,” he chuckles, “Usually the Black Paladin would dance with an Altean princess, you see, but I’m not a princess.”

“The Black Paladin before the last was a woman,” Yuuri points out, “Okukawa Minako.”

Viktor nods, with this little amused gleam in his eye.

“Coincidentally,” he tells Yuuri, “We didn’t have a princess then either. So she danced with the prince at the time.”

And it’s probably the many toasts he’s had to make throughout the night, but there’s a defiance sparking to life inside of Yuuri.

“Well, there’s nothing stopping us from dancing,” he challenges, “On my planet, there are men who love other men, and women who love other women. I don’t see why only a man and a woman should be allowed to dance.”

Viktor looks back over his shoulder. There are no same-sex couples out on the dancefloor, but when he turns back, there’s a thoughtful look on his face.

“We have men here who love other men too,” Viktor says consideringly, and then his blue eyes flick up to meet Yuuri, “We could. We  _ could  _ dance if you wanted.”

He pauses for a moment, seemingly thinking about it. Then, he nods, once. There’s a defiant tension gathering along his jawline.

“You’re absolutely right,” he declares, “There  _ should  _ be no reason why two men can’t dance together.”

He extends his hand.

“So let’s dance,” he says.

Yuuri closes his eyes for a second.

_ How does he always seem to get himself into these situations? _ he wonders to himself— before he puts his hand in Viktor’s.

The thing is— he actually  _ does  _ know how to dance Altean ballroom. Minako had taught him as a child, humming quietly and spinning him gently around the room as he’d stood unsteadily on her feet— but Viktor looks surprised when he changes their lead midway through the dance. Viktor falls into being led with a sort of surprised delight, and even laughs a little when they run into trouble on the next turn. Viktor is considerably taller than Yuuri is, and he has to stretch up for Viktor to pass under his arm.

There are some double-takes as they twirl through the room, but no one says anything. They even get a few smiles as they pass. At the end of the song, Viktor is smiling too, a small smile, but one that seems to light him up from inside with a pleased glow. As the song trails to an end, they slow to a halt, standing in each other’s arms.

“That was nice,” Viktor says quietly, still smiling that small smile, “Thank you.”

Yuuri smiles back shyly.

“You’re welcome,” he says.

Phichit appears suddenly from the crowd then, looking serious, and they step back from one another. They have business to attend to. Across the room from them, he can see Chris faltering mid-conversation with someone, eyes narrowing at them. Mila and Yuri are also watching from the snacks table.

Phichit shakes his head slightly.

“Not Altea,” he says in an undertone, and Viktor lets out a small breath, looking relieved. He nods solemnly.

“Looks like our work here is done,” he says.

Around them, the crowd is dwindling fast as the hour draws late. Most of the attendees have either gone home, or are currently leaving for the night. The party is drawing to a close.

“We should head back to the Castle,” Viktor declares, “We have a long day ahead of us tomorrow.”

 

* * *

 

The celebration is over by the next day. Viktor disappears again for what Yuuri later discovers is a meeting with the Council, leaving the rest of them under Sara’s command. They spend most of the day helping the crew stock up on supplies, carrying crates of medical equipment, spare parts, and other miscellaneous items into the Castle.

Yuuri is reminded again of the alienness of his crew when he witnesses, first hand, Yuri lift a crate as tall as Yuuri over his head as easy as breathing. He also witnesses, first hand, Mila lift Yuri  _ and _ the crate he’s holding over  _ her  _ head. Yuri hadn't been happy about that. He hadn't been happy about it at all.

After Viktor returns, they set off immediately for the next planet.

The next planet goes much the same way as Altea did, with celebrations and a huge parade. Again, they are made to form Voltron to back up the parade. Yuuri is starting to understand it as a display of arms, as he tiredly mentions to Phichit over lunch.

“Smart!” Viktor chirps, with his constant and uncanny ability to overhear conversations, “The mere existence of Voltron deters rogue enemies from attacking. It's especially important for Voltron to be seen by a large amount of people whenever a new team of Paladins ascend, so people know that the new team is functioning!”

There’s dancing again at the end of the day, inside a large community hall. It’s nothing as grand as the New Altean palace but, this time, Phichit gets to enjoy the dancing. This planet is not on their watchlist. With his cheeky smile, Phichit easily manages to get someone to teach him the local folk dances, and takes to it with delight. 

Meanwhile, Yuuri makes the rounds with Viktor, toasting all the important people who need to be toasted, and shaking all the right hands. To the same extent the Councillors had been displeased to meet him, the tribal chiefs here are  _ delighted.  _ They shake his hand so profusely, eyes shining with such gratitude as they thank him— it all makes him feel a little weird, honestly.

“This is one of those planets,” Viktor explains in a mutter, “That presents an easy target for enemy takeover. But because Voltron is sworn to come to their defense if they are attacked, no one will attack them because of the treaty.”

Once they’ve finished their rounds, they stand by watching because neither of them know the local dances.

That only lasts until Phichit pulls Yuuri into the ring. He fumbles and stumbles through the whole song, but the locals are laughing and smiling— charmed. Phichit pulls Mila in next, and together the two conspire to bring sullen Yuri into the circle, before Chris joins of his own accord.

Soon, there are four people staggering, stumbling, and flailing their way through the dance, while Viktor stands by the side and laughs.

Yuuri drags him in on the next loop.

* * *

 

 

The list of planets to visit pass in a blur of dancing, laughing, and toasts. There are plenty of times when travel between planets takes long enough to give them rest days, and so they take those rest days to train.

Yuuri had thought that after a solid week of forming Voltron for parades, they’d have it down perfectly, but he’d been wrong. The first time they try to form Voltron in a battle simulation, they run into trouble.

“That battleship is firing on the Castle!” Yuuri shouts, wincing as he takes fire from the drones swarming around him. The rest of the team is doing no better. They are very quickly being overwhelmed. “We need to form Voltron and take down that battleship!”

“The Castle can take care of itself,” Yuri snarls, “There’s another ship that’s  _ escaping!” _

“Good. It’s out of this battle now.”

“We can’t just  _ let it go!” _

Yuuri bites back his annoyance.

“Let’s form Voltron first,” he snaps, “and talk about that when we’re not being overwhelmed.”

But try as they might, they hadn’t been able to form Voltron. Separated and confused, they had easily been picked off, one by one, by the countless drones buzzing around them.

“To form Voltron, you must fight  _ as one,”  _ Viktor had lectured, one failed simulation later, “But the team was busy squabbling over battle strategies. You were not fighting as one!”

He’d turned to Yuuri.

“You make good decisions,” he’d said, “But that’s not all a leader has to do. You need to unite your team behind your decisions.”

He’d turned to Yuri.

“You’re stubborn,” he’d said, “That’s good when you really think your team’s making a big mistake, but you also need to learn to trust your leader— that’s what being a team player means!”

Some of their free days they dedicate to running individual flight simulations. Phichit and Mila get the beginner obstacle courses to ease them into flying, but Yuuri and Yuri don’t get let off nearly so easily. The simulations Viktor sets for them are some of the hardest simulations Yuuri’s ever flown. Even Yuri,  the prodigy that he is, usually goes white-knuckled when flying Viktor’s obstacle courses.

“You’re too impulsive!” Viktor always lectures Yuri, “You don’t plan your route before you fly! You’re lucky you’re quick enough to dodge things as they come, but if you actually  _ think  _ before you fly, you won’t be so slow.”

Yuuri is truly mind-boggled the first time he hears Viktor call Yuri  _ slow _ . Yuri has the fastest completion speeds of them all, faster than Yuuri for sure, but Viktor— Viktor is a person with high expectations.

They also have team training sessions, in their Lions, which Yuuri takes as a chance to learn about his team’s piloting styles. The Yellow Lion has the sturdiest armor but is a little slow and unwieldy. Phichit usually just absorbs attacks rather than dodge them. Mila is flighty, usually preferring to avoid damage by putting distance between her and her attacker, but is otherwise the most level-headed in battle. In the Blue Lion, Christophe is an excellent distance attacker. He has good reflexes and amazing aim, and can easily snipe a drone out of the sky from across the battlefield. And Yuri— 

Yuri is arguably the most talented pilot of them all. In the Red Lion, the smallest and fastest Lion, he never has a problem flying straight into enemy gunfire. He is also, however, impulsive and competitive to a fault. He’s easy to anger, and has been lured into traps by Viktor on countless occasions — to Viktor’s scathing lectures. Viktor seems to save his most scathing lectures for Yuri, who is thick-skinned, and who always responds with attitude.

There’s one day that Yuri stumbles out of the simulator after  _ hours  _ of flying the same grueling simulation over and over, and when Viktor begins again with his relentless lecturing— Yuri just seems to snap.

“You think you can make better time on this course?” he challenges.

And Viktor just laughs.

“Do you think I can’t?” he challenges in return.

“You talk a lot,” Yuri snarls, “But I haven’t seen you fly in  _ years.  _ You’re getting  _ old.” _

Viktor smiles.

“Leo,” he says pleasantly, “Will you reset the simulation for me please?”

As Leo jumps up, fingers flying over the controls, Viktor climbs into the simulator while Yuuri looks on nervously. Is Viktor really going the fly the simulation?

“Ready, Yuri?” Viktor’s voice comes tinny over the radio, once the simulation is set, “Watch closely.”

He then proceeds to  _ slaughter  _ the simulation.

His time, when he finishes the course, is a good half a minute shorter than Yuri’s two minutes and thirty seconds.  _ Yuuri’s  _ time is two minutes and  _ forty-five  _ seconds.

He steps casually out of the simulator, not a hair out of place, with that closed-eyed smile still on his face.

“You all are a lot more mediocre than you think,” he says, in an echo of their first day training together, “Do you already believe you’re the best?”

Yuuri doesn't know what to say.

“Viktor was Altea’s child prodigy long before Yuri was,” Chris explains to him later, laughing, “Everyone thought he was going to be the next Black Paladin for sure — until he dropped out of flight school at sixteen.”

“Why did he drop out?” Yuuri asks.

Chris smiles apologetically.

“You’ve got to ask him that yourself.”

Yuuri feels uncomfortable at the mere thought of asking Viktor something that personal. They are friends for sure, but he doesn’t think they’ve known each other long enough to ask about something so deeply personal.

“Why did everyone think he was going to become a Paladin?” he asks instead, “I mean, it wasn’t like everyone expected  _ Yuri  _ to become a Paladin. In fact, they were pretty shocked.”

“Well, Viktor’s always had a connection with the Lions,” Chris explains, then stiffens, as if realizing what he’s said.

“A connection?”

Chris nods.

“But you should really be hearing all this from him,” he says uneasily.

Yuuri sympathizes. He’d feel terrible answering personal questions about Phichit, so he drops the subject.

They soon begin to move away from New Altea and into the darker side of the star system. They pass Olkarion on the way, and Sara gets to say hello to her family. Phichit’s stealth mission reveals nothing on Olkarion.

Mamora is the last of the developed planets before they move into the more dangerous side of the star system. The Galra all eye Viktor with suspicion, and are generally a quiet and reserved bunch. With Chris however, they open up readily, grinning wide with sharp canines, laughing and joking with him in their native tongue. Chris himself seems a lot looser with his own people.

“Everyone’s still suspicious of the Galra because of what the Galra Empire did centuries ago,” Viktor explains quietly, “Some people take it out on the Galra that they meet. It’s an ugly business— and the Council implicitly condones it by doing nothing— not even a statement.”

No wonder they all look at Viktor like that.

Security on Mamora is a lot more difficult than all the other planets. Mamora is technically a giant anchored ship, with particularly tight security, rather than an actual planet.

“Mamora has a rich history, you know,” Chris tells them, acting as a tour guide of sorts, “After Daibazaal, the original homeworld of the Galra, was destroyed, the Galra broke into two camps: the tyrannical Galra Empire, and the Blade of Mamora, a secret resistance consisting of Galra who  _ opposed  _ the Empire. They ran many infiltration missions, had their own advanced fleet, and possessed an army of elite Galra assassins. The Blade was a crucial partner in the takedown of the Galra Empire, and this ship was the ship they based their operations out of.”

His smile turns a little wry.

“Not that it comes up much in the history books.”

According to Chris, the Blade had apparently been a wary and secretive bunch, and accordingly, Mamora isn't an easy base to infiltrate. The doors and equipment can only be accessed by a Galra, and so Chris vanishes with Phichit when he slips away during the party. 

There’s a bit of a tense situation near the end when an elderly Galra general looks at his watch, noting to Viktor and Yuuri —

“Christophe has been gone for awhile now, hasn’t he? Where has that child run off to?”

— before Phichit and Chris come tumbling through the curtains of a nearby balcony. They both freeze as everyone turns to look, and there's a long moment of silence as they all trade increasingly frantic looks between one another until—

“An  _ Earthling?” _ the elderly general demands,  _ “Really,  _ Christophe? All these nice young Galra women to choose from, and you choose an alien!”

Phichit’s mouth falls open.

“No,” he says, “This is  _ really _ not what it looks like.”

Chris elbows him in the ribs.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” he demands, eyes darting to Phichit and then to the rest of the room meaningfully, “This is  _ exactly _ what it looks like. Right?”   


Phichit’s beginning to blush, but he seems to get the message.

“Right,” he says stiffly, “This is exactly what it looks like and by that I mean that we— uh—  _ mmm— _ that is to say— yes. _ ” _

Yuri puts his face into his hands. Chris is somehow managing to keep his laughter in, but Yuuri, on the other hand, has caught Mila’s eye and is already beginning to snicker along with her. Viktor elbows him in the ribs.

Dramatic moment over, everyone turns back to whatever they were doing.

Back on the ship, Yuuri really can’t help himself.

“Phichit and Christophe, sitting in a tree—” he whisper-sings.

Phichit elbows him without looking, and Yuuri doubles over, gasping. Phichit has especially bony elbows, and he definitely knows how to use them.

 

* * *

 

After Mamora, they move into the rest of the star system for real. It’s a drastic change from the towering palaces of New Altea and Olkarion, the gleaming metal of mechanical Mamora. There are an especially large number of Balmeras in this part of the universe, lots of mining and farming planets.

It is also, as Yuuri soon realizes, pirate territory.

They’ve graduated from flying Viktor’s grueling exercises in simulations, to flying his grueling exercises in real life,  _ as Voltron. _ Flying as Voltron is very different from flying alone, they’ve found. And so it is with little luck that they are trying to retrieve Viktor, who’s hiding out in a nearby asteroid belt in a small jet. Considering the  _ size  _ of Voltron though, it’s like rooting for a needle in a haystack. They just don't have that level of fine-motor control.

It certainly doesn't help when Mila and Yuri begin fighting, and when they start jabbing at their controls mid-quarrel. Yuuri just buries his face in his arms as Voltron begins to  _ flail. _

“Everyone,  _ stop moving!”  _ he shouts after five minutes of hopeless flailing.

Everyone stops.

Voltron floats, perfectly still, listing a little to one side.

“Okay,” Yuuri says, “Let’s try this again. Slowly. Mila, do you want to give it another go?”

“I can try,” she says.

Voltron’s left hand reaches out carefully towards the asteroid belt, fingers spreading slowly. The belt is slightly out of reach. In silence, they continue to list helplessly to the side.

Mila sighs.

“Can we—” she begins, “Sort of— I don't know,  bring Voltron upright? We’re too far away now.”

They dissolve again into flailing as Yuri loses his patience and starts to jab at his controls angrily, yelling incoherently. Viktor is laughing again.

“Stop,  _ stop,”  _ Yuuri calls for order, “Yuri,  _ stop.” _

Yuri stops, with an angry huff.

“Yuri,” Yuuri says patiently, “When we’re impatient, we count backwards from ten. Ten, nine…”

Yuri groans, but he picks up counting with Yuuri nevertheless. Yuuri can feel his own frustration ebb a little as they count together.

“Eight, seven…”

He’s been trying to teach Yuri some of the exercises he uses for his anxiety, to help him manage his anger. He  _ thinks _ they’ve been helping. Yuri has stopped protesting them in any case. He doesn’t know how much of that is just to humor him, but Yuri doesn’t seem to be the kind to just  _ humor  _ people.

“Okay,” Yuuri says, when they are both done, “Let’s take a moment to think about this.”

They jerk again as Voltron’s right leg shoots out.

“Chris!” Yuuri cries, betrayed. Chris has always been one of the more level-headed of the team.

“Sorry,” his voice comes over the radio, “I just instinctively kicked out to bring us upright, like swimming, you know?”

“Swimming,” Yuri says flatly.

“I don't think that really works in zero gravity,” Phichit muses.

“You need to use your blasters,” Mila adds.

“Right,” Chris says. There's a click, and then all of a sudden, they are  _ hurtling  _ towards the Castle.

Yuuri screams. Chris screams. Everyone is screaming. Even Viktor has begun to scream, sounding more surprised than anything.

“ _ Stop!”  _ Phichit shrieks,  _ “Stop!” _

_ “Ahhhhh!”  _ Yuri is yelling.

A click.

“This is Intergalactic Police Craft Three-Seven-Six to the Castle of Lions. Can Voltron help us?”

_ “Ahhhh!” _

_ “Chris, stop!” _

_ “Phichit, fire your blasters—” _

_ “Ahhhhhhhhhh!” _

_ “Particle barrier up!”  _ Viktor shrieks.

A particle barrier comes up around the Castle, and they bounce off it, hard, before slowing to a halt.

“Castle of Lions?” prompts the unfamiliar voice, “Can Voltron help us?”

Yuuri reaches out shakily, and lets the call through.

“Erm,” he begins, refraining from telling their alien caller that  _ they  _ need help themselves, “What do you need?”

“There’s a pirate vessel speeding towards you now. Can you catch it?”

Yuuri leans forward in his seat to look down the length of Voltron’s body. There  _ is  _ a tiny vessel speeding past them and towards the asteroid belt behind them. Speeding after it is a less tiny vessel, marked with the logo of the Intergalactic Police. It’s never going to catch up with the pirate vessel, but Voltron is a hundred foot tall robot. The vessel is within easy reach if they just—

“Right,” Yuuri says, “Can someone…?”

But instead of an arm reaching out, like he’d expected, a  _ leg  _ shoots out and  _ smashes  _ through the asteroid belt next to them.

_ “Ahhhh!” _

“Phichit!” he wails, through the ensuing screams, “What are you doing? You’re a leg!”

“Sorry!” Phichit yelps, “You said catch it, and then it was a knee-jerk reaction.”

The displaced asteroids begin to rocket off one another. The pirate vessel stops, its escape route cut off by the moving asteroid belt on one side, and Voltron on the other. Further down from them, a pinprick of silver shoots out of the belt. It’s Viktor.

“Hey!” Viktor says crossly, “That could have killed me!”

But a moment later, there’s a flurry of activity, and then  _ hundreds of ships  _ begin to pour out of the belt like ants.

“Pirate vessels!” Chris cries, “They were all hiding in the belt!”

“I’ll call for back up,” the police craft announces.

“No need,” Yuuri sighs, “Come on guys, let’s split up into our Lions. The exercise is over.”

They manage to round up a good third of the escaping pirates between themselves, and the small army of police vessels that come soon after. There had been too many to stop all of them from escaping, but the Intergalactic Police seemed quite happy with their haul.

“Thank you for your help, Paladins of Voltron,” an officer sighs in the aftermath, “The pirate problem has been getting out of hand and this was a sorely needed victory — but how did you know that they were hiding in the asteroid belt?”

A long silence.

“Voltron,” Viktor says stiffly, “Has extremely good sensors.”

Going into the planets after that, Yuuri thinks he can understand a little better. This part of the universe is populated by a suspicious, hardy bunch. The streets are dark and dirty. Many of the aliens here have prosthetic limbs or glass eyes— body parts lost in battles with pirates. It’s a far cry from the places they’ve been before, the machines here lopsided and staggering chimeras, really just pieces of different machinery hammered poorly together.

And at first, he thinks that it's just his imagination, but after the first three planets he becomes increasingly certain that it's not.

The people out here  _ really _ don't like Viktor.

They’re perfectly happy to see the rest of them. They greet Yuuri and the other Paladins with cheers and some of them have  _ hand-drawn banners _ , or requests for  _ autographs  _ — but they look upon Viktor with cautious wariness, suspicious and mistrustful. When they speak to Viktor, they are rude and short.

And yet, Viktor doesn’t get frustrated even once. He just smiles tolerantly on throughout it all, ever-patient and ever-kind.

It breaks Yuuri’s heart.

“Why do they treat you like that?” he eventually blurts out, as they are returning to the Castle one day, “They seem alright with the rest of us.”

Viktor pauses, and for a moment, looks like he's trying to decide whether or not to give Yuuri an honest answer. Eventually, he just smiles.

“Treat me like what?” he asks, with that blank smile.

On the fifth planet, the cheers turn to  _ jeers  _ as Viktor steps off the Castle after them. At that point, Yuuri makes his mind up.

There is an announcer reading out their names and their titles as they form a line, Paladins of Voltron with Yuuri in the center of the stage — but he (she?) falters as Yuuri reaches behind him and  _ wrestles _ Viktor into the center with him. Viktor resists, and he’s got a  _ ridiculous  _ alien strength, but he gives in rather than make a scene as Yuuri continues pulling at him.

The crowd falls silent as they fall in line. Viktor is still protesting quietly beside him, but Yuuri just tilts his chin up defiantly, twines his fingers together with Viktor’s, and raises their joint hands.

“Prince Viktor of Altea,” he shouts, into the silence.

The crowd begins to mutter, looking to one another as if for directions. The announcer is blinking rapidly, unsure of what to say.

“What are you  _ doing?” _ Viktor whispers.

“Viktor!” Mila yells, and begins to clap.

“Yeah, Viktor!” Chris joins in, clapping.

The row of them begin to holler as Viktor whips around, trying to shush them. But the front row of the audience has begun to clap hesitantly — and soon, everyone is clapping too. Mila puts her arms around Viktor’s waist and  _ lifts him.  _ Viktor lets out a very undignified sound. As Phichit starts crowding the rest of them into a group hug, Yuuri is helplessly smushed up against Viktor’s front. With nothing else to do, he puts his arms around Viktor’s waist too.

Viktor drapes one arm around Yuuri’s neck.

When Yuuri looks up at him, he is flushed up to his pointy ears. He lets out a burst of exasperated laughter, shaking his head, and then covers his face with one hand. Yuuri realises then that Viktor’s genuine smile isn’t very photogenic at all, but Yuuri can’t help but smile in return. When he smiles genuinely — Viktor has a heart-shaped smile.

They all stumble back onto the ship after that, laughing and whooping in glee. Viktor’s hand is still clasped firmly in Yuuri’s. Viktor himself is still flushed and smiling. He shakes his head exasperatedly.

“Yuuri,” he says breathlessly, and then,  _ “Yuuri.” _

The sound of Yuuri’s name rolls so gently, so beautifully off his tongue.

On the next planet, there is a palace again with much dancing. They make their rounds, and it takes much shorter to do so. The ballrooms here are more community centers than ballrooms. They aren’t very big. Yuuri pulls Viktor along with him, and introduces him to the people who need to be talked to. They still look a little unsure of what to think, but they seem a little more open to Viktor when Yuuri is so earnestly singing his praises.

Viktor is quiet and flushed throughout the whole thing, strangely shy. When they are done making the rounds, Yuuri pulls him into a dance for the first time since New Altea.

“Yuuri,” he whispers, and then laughs helplessly, “Yuuri, they don’t dance Altean ballroom here.”

“This is the part of the night when we’re traditionally supposed to dance,” Yuuri echoes from long ago, “You and I.”

So they dance one round of Altean ballroom, and then Viktor corrals him into a dance-form that he doesn’t recognize. It’s a stumbling fumbling thing for a bit, but Viktor is a good lead, so they manage after Yuuri’s had the chance to process the change.

“You know Altean ballroom, but you don’t know standard intergalactic ballroom?”

Viktor laughs. It’s his genuine laugh, the heart-shaped laugh that Yuuri finds so endearing.

“Oh, I’m just a country-hick, Your Highness."

Viktor pushes forward and whirls them quickly around, his smile heart-achingly sincere.

“Call me Viktor,” he breathes, “Please.”

“Viktor,” Yuuri says, once.

Viktor smiles, eyes bright, flushing.

When they get back on the ship after that, the rest of them make scarce. There had been —  _ something  _ at that party that had the same effects as alcohol, but no one had thought to tell them. Yuuri and Viktor stumble into an empty room, tall, dark, and  _ wide.  _ There’s a wall of windows on one side where the stars shine in, the only light in the room.

Their steps echo through the cavernous space until Viktor pulls Yuuri around by their joint hands. He steps forward once, into Yuuri’s space, and Yuuri steps back.

“You don’t know standard ballroom?” he asks again, quiet, and twirls Yuuri under his arm.

“Are you going to teach me then?” Yuuri asks.

“I could,” Viktor returns.

“Teach me,” Yuuri pleads.

They twirl around the room, alone in the light of the stars, their steps echoing up and down the expanse of the room like the rhythm of a song. The stars by them are blurry with the drink inside them, but all the more beautiful for it. After a while, Yuuri feels familiar enough with the steps to change their lead. Viktor twirls gently under his arm once, and falls into being led.

“You’re very,” Viktor breathes, and then drops his eyes shyly, “beautiful.”

Yuuri can’t help the flush, the smile that rises to his face.

“You,” he just says, and flushes more deeply.

Viktor laughs quietly.

Eventually they stumble to lie on the floor by the wide expanse of windows, fingers twined and looking out into the stars. The Castle is still by the long length of the asteroid belt they’d disrupted so early on. Beyond it — the stars go on and on and on.

“I saw you flying,” Viktor says suddenly, “That first time, in the Black Lion.”

“Oh?” Yuuri says.

He can’t help the self-consciousness that comes then. He knows he’s not the best flyer. There are definitely flyers better than him, flyers more deserving of the position of Black Paladin. Yuri is one of them.  _ Viktor _ is one of them. Viktor, by all means, would be a better Black Paladin than Yuuri.

Viktor’s fingers tighten around his.

“You fly like,” he breathes, “Like you’re making music _.” _

There’s this note in his voice, quavering and  _ awestruck _ —

“You fly with this rhythm, this flair— Yuuri—” he laughs, and presses a messy kiss to Yuuri’s cheek, “I watched you fly and I thought — I want to fly with him. I want to understand how he makes music when he flies.”

Yuuri sits up suddenly. Viktor blinks up at him, flushed, with his eyes reflecting the stars and his silver hair loose and his white robes spread around him like a halo.

“I’ll take you with me,” Yuuri promises, “Let’s go flying.”

“Let’s go,” Viktor gasps, sitting up too, “Now.”

“Not now,” Yuuri says firmly, “Tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow?” Viktor asks.

Yuuri reaches out and pushes his fringe back from where it’d been falling from his face. Viktor leans forward and—

“Shhh,” Yuuri soothes, turning his cheek to the kiss, and then kissing Viktor on the forehead instead, “You’re drunk. We’ll see if you still want this tomorrow, okay?”

“Yuuri,” Viktor breathes.

“Tomorrow,” Yuri whispers back, “If you still want this.”

 

* * *

 

Tomorrow never comes. In the wee hours of the morning, a distress beacon sounds and they run down to the bridge. Viktor strides up to the main console — flightsuit, hair tied neatly back, and lets the call come through. Their eyes meet once, over the console, before they turn their attention back up at the holographic screen.

“There are Balmerans trapped in a collapsed mine,” the distressed caller informs them, “In our vessels, we will not be able to reach them in time.”

Tomorrow has to wait for later.

 

**Author's Note:**

> I don't have a beta so if you notice any grammatical errors feel free to leave a comment highlighting it to me, telling me what you liked, or even just to yell!


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